It is now ranked 80th,below Kyrgyzstan and Kosovo.
The shut down of the last pro-democracy newspaper in the city means independent coverage outside of the Alibaba-ownedSouth China Morning Postwill be left to a small band of online outlets includingCitizen News,Stand News andHong Kong Free Press.
The chilling effect on all of them and anyone they interview is real.
Kevin Carrico,anApple Daily columnist and senior lecturer in Chinese studies at Monash University,said he was drawn partly to Hong Kong after leaving China because of the dynamism and diversity of Hong Kong’s media scene.
“The city that used to be known for freedom of the press,for dynamic and open debate,is now genuinely missing those freedoms,” he said.
Hong Kong’s Chief Executive Carrie Lam offered reporters an impossible task when she was asked by journalists how they could avoid breaching the national security laws,given they covered any threat to the authority of the state.
“I think you are in a better position to answer that question,” she said on Tuesday. “Don’t try to beautify these acts of endangering national security. Don’t try to accuse the Hong Kong authorities[of] using the national security law as a tool to suppress the media or to stifle the freedom of expression.”
Lam said there was no problem with criticising the Hong Kong government but inciting subversion crossed a red line.
The challenge for the media and the public is knowing where that line is.
Hongkongers were arrested in July for holding up blank pieces of paper after political slogans were banned. A year later,public gatherings outside of more than four are still outlawed under COVID-19 restrictions,yet banquets for more than 180 people inside restaurants are now allowed.
Exiled Hong Kong pro-democracy leader Nathan Law said it was difficult to comprehend “how dreadful” the closure ofApple Daily is for Hong Kong,not only to its journalistic landscape but also to the people and the city itself.
“The parent company of Apple Daily,Next Digital Limited,is a listed company,” he said on Twitter on Thursday. “The government forced a listed company to close itself in a matter of days.”
The implications go well beyond the freedom of the press in this city that prides itself as a global commercial hub. Financial analysts are likely to think twice before reporting negative outlooks for Chinese state-owned companies. Academics are already avoiding any direct criticism of the government;fewer still are willing to be quoted on the record.
That’s an environment where accountability goes out the window.
“I’m not in the field of business or finance but if I was I wouldn’t feel too comfortable about the Hong Kong government’s ability to treatApple Daily this way,” said Carrico.
Carrico saidApple Daily was a product of Hong Kong’s unique circumstances.
“It’s a newspaper established by Lai,an immigrant to Hong Kong from China,who eventually ended up building one of the newspapers that was most confrontational and critical of China’s takeover of Hong Kong’s institutions,” he said.
“To think that Jimmy Lai,or other editors atApple Daily are facing potential life sentences for really what boiled down to nothing more than speech crimes,it's really beyond comprehension.”
Lai Ching-te,the Vice-President of Hong Kong’s threatened liberal democratic neighbour Taiwan,said “freedom of the press is like the air for democracy”.
“I feel quite sad today,” he said. “The people of Hong Kong are losingApple Daily but they will not lose their courage.”
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One Next Digital editor,now out of a job and considering leaving journalism,went searching for a copy of the lastApple Dailyat Hong Kong newsagents on Thursday.
“I could not even find one for myself this morning,” they said.
“The Apple may have fallen but the seeds have been planted and rooted within our people.”
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