One year was all it took for a Beijing-imposed National Security Law to take down Hong Kong’s largest and loudest pro-democracy newspaper.
Next Media announced Wednesday that Apple Daily, its flagship tabloid, would publish its final copy Thursday due to an untenable environment in which its journalists had been arrested and millions of dollars in assets had been frozen. Its digital platform will cease operations on the same day, the company said in a statement. The news sent a deep chill through Hong Kong’s media industry and undermined government claims the new legislation would not diminish press freedom. Last year, China’s ruling Communist Party moved to bring Hong Kong in line with its authoritarian rule by bypassing the city’s legislature to implement the security law. It punishes anything the authorities deem to be subversion, secession, terrorism and collusion with foreign forces with up to life in prison. While city leader Carrie Lam said back then that press freedoms would still be protected, Apple Daily staffers say they knew it was only a matter of time before they were targeted. „But it still came as a shock when it happened,“ said one journalist at the publication, who asked to remain anonymous out of security fears. Since the law took effect, Apple Daily has been crippled bit by bit. Founder Jimmy Lai — already in jail for attending a pro-democracy rally — has been arrested and charged with colluding with foreign forces to endanger national security. Five of the newspaper’s top editors and executives have been accused of the same crime, apparently for using articles to call for foreign governments to sanction Hong Kong. Hundreds of police officers have twice raided the publication’s newsroom, most recently seizing computers and materials — an alarming development for journalists and their sources in an increasingly sensitive environment. Several Apple Daily journalists had already quit before this month, saying the rewards of their work no longer outweighed the risk of imprisonment. Even as official pressure piled on the newspaper, public support surged. Last Friday, after the arrest of its top editors, Apple Daily printed 500,000 copies which sold out. That wasn’t enough to counter a financial squeeze brought on by Hong Kong authorities. While Next Media told investors it had enough money to last 18 months from April, in recent days the paper’s bank accounts had been frozen. On Wednesday, as the board met to discuss the paper’s future, police officers again descended on the newsroom arresting another journalist. Hours later, the paper announced that after 26 years on newsstands, it would close its doors. „A woman sent me a note a few days ago saying without Apple Daily she just doesn’t feel as safe as she used to with a free press as the protector of society,“ said Mark Simon, one of Lai’s top advisers.
