Hong Kong police raided the office of Apple Daily, a newspaper known for its critical coverage of China and Hong Kong, on Thursday morning.
Five senior executives, including the editor-in-chief, Ryan Law, have been arrested. Dozens of police officers took part in the raid and blocked all entrances to the office. Journalists have been barred from filming the raid.
Apple Daily said board members of its parent company, Next Digital, were arrested, including Chief Executive Officer Cheung Kim-hung, Chief Operating Officer Chow Tat-kuen, Deputy Chief Editor Chan Puiman, and Chief Executive Editor Cheung Chi-wai.
The Hong Kong government said in a statement Thursday that the National Security Department had arrested five directors of a company on suspicion of collusion with a foreign country.
Raid broadcast on Facebook
The statement said four men and a woman aged between 47 and 63 were arrested. No other details were provided by the government.
Apple Daily broadcast the raid live on its Facebook page, showing how officers set up a cordon around the complex and walked through the building.
“They arrived around 7 a.m. this morning, our building is besieged,” an unnamed reporter said in a live commentary with the broadcast. “Now we can see them moving boxes of materials onto their truck.”
National security police said that officers had searched a media company with a warrant that covers “the power of searching and seizure of journalistic materials.”
Publisher already in jail
The publisher of Apple Daily, Jimmy Lai, was arrested last year under the same law.
Lai is currently serving a 20-month prison sentence for his role in unauthorized assemblies during mass pro-democracy protests of 2019. Last month, authorities froze Lai’s assets and shares in Next Digital.
Apple Daily has backed Hong Kong’s pro-democracy movement, including the massive and sometimes violent protests that swept the international financial hub in 2019.
This article was originally published on Deutsche Welle. Read the original article here.
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TNL Editor: Bryan Chou (@thenewslensintl)
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