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August 10, 2020First high-profile arrest in Hong Kong for violating the national security law imposed by Beijing and heavily criticized internationally. The pro-democratic editor Jimmy Lai Chee-ying was arrested in the morning on suspicion of "collusion with foreign forces", one of the crimes punishable by up to life imprisonment by the new law that came into force on 30 June. On its Facebook page, the tabloid Apple Daily, owned by Lai himself, published images of the arrest of the 71-year-old tycoon, taken over by agents at his home in Ho Man Tin, a residential area on the Kowloon Peninsula.
Lai's arrest was confirmed on Twitter by an executive of the Next Digital group owned by Lai, Mark Simon, who is abroad, and by the Hong Kong police themselves on Facebook: the agents also carried out a blitz in the headquarters of the Lai group, in the Tseung Kwan O neighborhood "to gather evidence related to the violation of national security" and further arrests during the day are not ruled out. In addition to Lai, at least six other people were arrested in the same operation, all from Hong Kong, aged between 39 and 72, for violations of national security law, association for fraud and other crimes. Among those arrested, writes the South China Morning Post, there are some executives of Lai's group and also the two children of the Hong Kong media entrepreneur.