6 former Apple Daily staffers plead guilty to collusion in Hong Kong

Six former executives of a now-defunct Hong Kong pro-democracy newspaper pleaded guilty on Tuesday to one count of collusion under the National Security Law that has silenced and jailed most opposition voices in the territory of southern China.

Apple Daily staff members were arrested last year during a crackdown on dissent after Beijing imposed the sweeping security law in response to widespread anti-government protests in 2019. They were charged with conspiracy to commit collusion with forces foreigners to endanger national security.

The law criminalizes acts of succession, subversion, terrorism and collusion with foreign forces. His maximum sentence is life imprisonment. But the six were expected to receive lesser sentences because of their guilty pleas.

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Editor Cheung Kim-hung, Associate Editor Chan Pui-man, Editor-in-Chief Ryan Law, Executive Editor-in-Chief Lam Man-chung and Editorial Writers Fung Wai-kong and Yeung Ching-kee, admit that they had conspired with the newspaper’s founder Jimmy Lai to call for the imposition of sanctions or a blockade, or engage in other hostile activities against Hong Kong or China.

Prosecutors alleged that three companies related to Apple Daily were also involved in the conspiracy from July 1, 2020, the day after the introduction of the National Security Act, until the day of the last edition newspaper printout, June 24, 2021.

They pointed to the English version of the post, alleging that it was introduced by Lai for the purpose of asking foreign forces to impose sanctions or be hostile against Hong Kong or China. They said that Lai was the mastermind of the conspiracy and that the six acted to implement the plans. After the security law was enacted, Apple Daily condemned the legislation as “bad law” and called for resistance, they added.

Hong Kong police officers escort Cheung Kim-hung, center, chief executive officer and chief executive officer of Next Digital Ltd to Apple Daily headquarters in Hong Kong. Six former Apple Daily executives pleaded guilty to one count of collusion on November 22, 2022, under the National Security Act that has jailed most of the opposition voices on Chinese soil.
(AP Photo/Kin Cheung, File)

Lai and the three companies were expected to plead not guilty to the charge and their trial is scheduled to begin on December 1. If convicted, Lai faces up to life in prison. If the companies are convicted, they could be fined and the proceeds of crime confiscated.

After hearing their pleas and the prosecution’s case, a High Court judge convicted the six. Their sentences would be handed down after Lai’s trial.

Spectators included local journalists and former Apple Daily employees, with some greeting the defendants before and after the hearing.

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Police took hard drives and laptops as evidence in a raid on Apple Daily’s offices in June 2021, sending shockwaves through the city’s media. The arrests of the paper’s top executives, editors and journalists, as well as the freezing of assets worth $2.3 million, led it to cease operations. It sold a million copies of its last edition.

Hong Kong fell more than 60 places to 148th in the latest Reporters Without Borders World Press Freedom Index, released in May. The media watchdog cited the closure of Apple Daily and Stand News, a vocal online media outlet that gained popularity during the 2019 protests but was forced to close during the ongoing crackdown.

The body also said the city’s press freedom had seen “an unprecedented setback” since the introduction of the security law which “serves as a pretext to silence independent voices” in the name of fighting crime of national security.

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Separately, nine people were found guilty of rioting during a violent protest in October 2019 in another Hong Kong court on Tuesday. They were among thousands of residents who were arrested for their role in the widespread protests three years ago.