Hong Kong: Editor, CEO denied bail in Apple Daily case
HONG KONG: The editor and publisher of the Apple Daily newspaper were arraigned on Saturday on charges under the city’s sweeping national security law.
Editor-in-chief Ryan Law, and Cheung Kim-hung, the newspaper’s publisher and chief executive officer of parent company Next Digital, were denied bail and their case was adjourned to August 13, according to a ruling by chief magistrate Victor So.
Law, 47, and Cheung, 59, were detained on Thursday. A charge sheet stated that between July 1, 2020 and April 3, 2021, they conspired with Next Digital founder Jimmy Lai and others to request foreign forces to impose sanctions or a blockade, or engage in other hostile activities against Hong Kong or China.
About 500 police officers on Thursday descended on the headquarters of Apple Daily, the second time in 12 months. They searched the company’s offices, barred journalists from their desks and eventually carted away nearly 40 computers belonging to journalists, the paper said.
Authorities also arrested chief operating Officer Royston Chow and deputy editors Chan Pui-man and Cheung Chi-wai.
The unprecedented move to arrest senior editors at a major newspaper - and warn other journalists to watch what they write - has rattled a city that has seen Beijing swiftly erode basic freedoms in the former British colony since historic street protests in 2019.
A police official on Thursday said Apple Daily that the newspaper’s office was now a crime scene.