Lam Man-chung, center, executive editor-in-chief of Apple Daily, gestures at the headquarters before the newspaper stop publishing in Hong Kong on June 23.Kin Cheung/The Associated Press
Hong Kong national security police on Wednesday charged four former senior employees at the now-defunct Apple Daily pro-democracy newspaper over alleged foreign collusion to endanger national security, weeks after the newspaper was forced to close after authorities froze its assets.
Lam Man-chung, who was the executive editor-in-chief of Apple Daily, was arrested Wednesday, according to the South China Morning Post newspaper, which cited an unnamed source. He is the eighth person from the newspaper arrested in recent weeks.
Three other former Apple Daily journalists – associate publisher and deputy chief editor Chan Pui-man, and editorial writers Fung Wai-kong and Yeung Ching-kee – were also detained Wednesday after their bail was revoked, according to local media reports.
Goodbye, Apple Daily. Goodbye, Hong Kong
All four were charged with conspiring to “collude with a foreign country or with external elements to endanger national security” under the city’s year-old national security law.
Ms. Chan was among five Apple Daily executives and editors arrested on June 17, while Mr. Yeung and Mr. Fung were arrested days after the police operation. Mr. Fung was arrested at the airport while allegedly attempting to leave to the United Kingdom.
Police confirmed that they laid the foreign collusion charges against four people, aged between 51 and 57, but did not identify them. They will appear in court Thursday.
Hong Kong security minister Chris Tang denied that the arrests would trigger a “white terror” – a term referring to a climate of fear caused by political repression – among journalists.
“Whoever committed an offense will be arrested, disregarding their background, whatever they do, or what are their professions,” he said.
“It doesn’t really matter. If they committed an offense, they will be arrested. And if there is any evidence, they will be prosecuted.”
The Hong Kong Journalists Association criticized the “repeated targeting of journalists” from Apple Daily, stating that it was “shocked and puzzled” by the arrest of Mr. Lam since the newspaper had already ceased operations.
The association also asked the government to explain how news and publishing work which has been legally carried out and is protected under the city’s mini-constitution, the Basic Law, could endanger national security.
“Freedom of the press and the freedom to publish are important cornerstones for the success of an international city,” it said in a statement on its Facebook page.
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