Journalists under control in Hong Kong

Audio 02:35

Jimmy Lai, escorted by police to his home in Hong Kong on August 10, 2020 VERNON YUEN AFP / Archivos

By: Amaury de Rochegonde Follow

6 min

The crackdown on the opposition press and journalists in Hong Kong is intensifying.

Press boss Jimmy Lai has just been detained there.

Publicity

The story was told by a Hong Kong daily,

, about the news channel i-Cable News.

While receiving Carrie Lam, the head of the local executive close to Beijing, the new director of the channel is criticized by his guest, during the break in the interview, that the questions asked are really " 

s ”.

And as if for fun, she adds that she understands why her press officer says of this new director, Oscar Lee, that he is " 

 ".

I-Cable news is not just any channel.

It was the first to launch in 1993 in non-stop news in Asia and it enjoys a solid reputation.

However, times are changing.

The new director encourages people to follow government press conferences, and investigations are more difficult.

As part of a restructuring, a plan of forty job cuts was decided in the drafting.

As luck would have it, those most reluctant to follow the instructions of the authorities were the target, which led to about twenty additional resignations in solidarity.

But it is above all the placement in pre-trial detention of the Hong Kong press magnate Jimmy Lai which shows that we are still a step further in the fight against the pro-democrats.

This boss of the

newspaper

appeared this Thursday with two of his senior executives for a dark story of using the headquarters of the newspaper for purposes not provided for in the rental agreement.

This is obviously a pretext, but Jimmy Lai may not be able to get out of prison before April, for his next audition.

In August 2020, a hundred police officers raided the building of his newspaper.

Several officials have been prosecuted for "collusion with foreign forces" under the new national security law imposed by Beijing in early summer.

More and more activists are going through prison.

In the case of Joshua Wong, a well-known figure in the 2019 movement, it is even his fourth time behind bars.

An opposition newspaper,

now publishes letters from inmates to keep them spirited.

As we can see, if the law of judicial extradition in China had to be abandoned after the demonstrations of last year, the capacity tightens its grip around the pro-democratic militants.

And this all the better as the Covid-19 allows it to strengthen its security system.

As for Jimmy Lai, he has already said that he will not give up.

Arrived at 12 years of Canton without a penny, he feels he owes everything to Hong Kong freedoms.

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• Hong Kong

• Freedom of press

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