Patrick Lam resigned and the newspaper's staff were immediately dismissed. The newspaper announced its closure in a statement 10 hours after the arrests and raid. Authorities froze more than $8 million of the newspaper's assets. More than 200 police officers raided the Stand News office at the same time they arrested the board members and editors. Stand News office raided, independent media outlets shutter Ho, Ng, Chow Tat-chi, and Fang are expected to report to police in late March, reported Reuters. Jimmy Lai was sentenced December 28 to 13 months in prison for alleged conspiracy to print, publish, distribute, and sell "seditious publications." The arrests of the six Stand News board members and editors followed his sentencing, reported the Star Observer.Īuthorities did not officially charge the board members with sedition, pending further investigations. Launched in 2014, Stand News was Hong Kong's last remaining independent pro-democracy publication following the closure of Apple Daily last June.Īuthorities also re-arrested and charged Chung Pui-kuen's wife, Chan Pui-man, formerly a senior editor with Apple Daily, while in prison where she's being held on separate charges.Īuthorities used the National Security Law to arrest and imprison Apple Daily owner Jimmy Lai, 74, for participating in a vigil marking the anniversary of the 1989 Tiananmen massacre in Beijing in August 2020. Recent court rulings and colonial-era laws covering sedition opened the gate for authorities to activate and utilize the new law against the media, including digital and social media, according to reports. The law covers terrorism, collusion with foreign forces, subversion, and secession. Reuters reported sedition is not among the offenses covered under the national security law imposed by Beijing in June 2020. The editors were formally charged, along with the corporate entity behind the media outlet, Best Pencil (Hong Kong) Limited, with conspiring to publish seditious materials following the enactment of the new security law. They reportedly confiscated her passport, identification card, mobile phones, and computers.Īuthorities released Ho, along with three other Stand News board members - barrister Margaret Ng, Chow Tat-chi, and Christine Fang - on bail 36 hours later on December 30.Īuthorities denied bail for editors Chung Pui-kuen and Patrick Lam the same day, reported Reuters. Police also searched Ho's home for more than two hours. Ho resigned from Stand News' board in June, reported the Star Observer. Ho, 44, was one of six former board members of the independent media outlet who were arrested under the suspicion of "conspiracy to publish seditious material." They were taken to the Western Police Station. Hong Kong's National Security Police arrested Ho in her home December 28 allegedly due to her past board membership at Stand News, a pro-democracy media group. Hong Kong lesbian Cantopop singer and pro-democracy activist Denise Ho is out on bail following her arrest late last month.