Hong Kong Bookstore Owner, Staff Arrested in Latest Crackdown on Dissent
HONG KONG – The owner of one of Hong Kong’s few remaining independent bookstores and three staff members were arrested Tuesday on suspicion of selling “seditious publications,” including a biography of jailed pro-democracy media tycoon Jimmy Lai. The arrests signal a continuing erosion of freedoms in the city following the imposition of a sweeping national security law by Beijing in 2020.
Pong Yat-ming, founder of Book Punch in Sham Shui Po, and his employees were taken into custody by national security police, according to reports from Ming Pao News, the South China Morning Post, and TVB. Authorities allege they “knowingly sold seditious publications,” a charge that carries a potential seven-year prison sentence.
The seized materials included “The Troublemaker: How Jimmy Lai Became A Billionaire, Hong Kong’s Greatest Dissident and China’s Most Feared Critic,” a biography of Lai written by Mark Clifford, a friend of Lai’s and former director of his media company, Next Digital.
Lai, 78, was sentenced last month to 20 years in prison on charges of sedition, conspiring with foreign forces, and publishing seditious material under the national security law.
Clifford described the arrests as a “cruel irony,” stating that selling a book about a journalist imprisoned for promoting free expression now constitutes a national security offense. He added that the incident demonstrates “how far Hong Kong has fallen from its tradition of free expression and free speech.” He also noted the arrests are “not an aberration but part of a continuing crackdown” and a breach of the Sino-British Joint Declaration, the agreement that guaranteed Hong Kong certain freedoms after its handover to China in 1997.
The arrests echo a similar incident in 2015 involving Causeway Bay Books, another bookstore known for selling political titles banned in mainland China. Five booksellers associated with the store disappeared, later confirmed to have been detained by mainland Chinese authorities. One of the booksellers, Lam Wing-kee, publicly recounted being held in detention for eight months and forced to make a confession.
A police spokesperson stated that authorities “will take actions according to actual circumstances and in accordance with the law,” but declined to comment directly on the recent arrests.
The crackdown on independent bookstores and pro-democracy voices in Hong Kong has drawn international concern, raising questions about the future of the city’s autonomy and freedoms.
