Hong Kong prepares for Stand News verdict in latest media freedom test | Court news

Two Hong Kong journalists will learn the outcome of their historic sedition trial this week, a verdict that could set the direction for the future of journalism in the Chinese city.

The two journalists Chung Pui-kuen and Patrick Lam are former editors of the now-closed independent news channel Stand News. If found guilty under Hong Kong's colonial-era sedition laws, they face up to two years in prison.

The couple were arrested by Hong Kong's national security police in December 2021 along with five other Stand News staff and board members, including Denise Ho, a pop singer turned prominent pro-democracy activist, and Margaret Ng, a widely respected former politician and lawyer.

Sedition laws were introduced in Hong Kong when the country was still a British colony, but they remained unused until 2020, when Beijing passed new national security laws in response to months of anti-government protests a year earlier.

In addition to new crimes such as “collusion with foreign powers” ​​or “subversion,” prosecutors have begun charging Hong Kong residents with the crime of “sedition” for the first time in over 50 years.

Although the trial of Chung and Lam is not the first sedition trial since the security law sparked political upheaval, it will be closely watched because it is the first trial to directly address journalism and the media, according to a Hong Kong-based observer who has followed the case.

The observer told Al Jazeera that the judges would have to define in their ruling what constitutes “legitimate reporting” and what constitutes “incitement to hatred” against the government.

“It is expected to be the first trial for sedition related to journalism, so we can assume that the judge will have to draw a line between acceptable and unacceptable journalism, especially if he actually finds the defendants guilty,” said the person, who wished to remain anonymous for fear of professional reprisals.

Prosecutors accuse Chung and Lam of conspiring to publish 17 inflammatory articles and opinion pieces that criticized the government and turned Stand News into a “political platform” rather than an independent media outlet. The articles included news about the pro-democracy camp in Hong Kong and comments from exiled politicians.

During the trial, defense attorney Audrey Eu argued not only that Chung and Lam did not write the articles in question, but that the prosecution had also failed to prove that they posed “any real threat to national security” or served as a political platform.

She said the news channel's work was in the public interest and its duty as the “fourth estate” was to closely scrutinise the Hong Kong government and hope that it would improve governance.

EU also criticized the prosecution's irregular conduct during the trial. In its cross-examinations and closing arguments, it relied on almost 600 new pieces of evidence that it had not presented before the trial began.

Eric Lai, a research fellow at the Georgetown Center for Asian Law, points out that since the sedition charges were reinstated, the conviction rate has been 100 percent. He expects Chung and Lam, who were held in pretrial detention for nearly a year before being granted bail at the start of the trial, will also be found guilty.

“Given the illiberal trend of Hong Kong courts' rulings since 2020, I do not expect a rule-of-law outcome. They do not respect the protection of basic human rights such as freedom of speech and expression, and do not even balance it with an overly broad national security agenda of the government,” Lai told Al Jazeera.

“Silencing independent voices”

Stand News was shut down shortly after the police raided its offices in December 2021. The media also deleted its online archive.

Although it was a relatively small outlet, its rapid decline reverberated beyond Hong Kong and was the latest sign of how the city once considered the freest in Asia was changing.

At the time of its closure, Stand News was one of the few pro-democracy news channels still operating. The popular tabloid Apple Daily had gone bankrupt six months earlier after hundreds of national security police raided the newsroom and arrested senior staff and founder Jimmy Lai.

The crackdown on Stand News drew criticism from human rights groups and some Western government officials, including US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who called the outlet “one of the few remaining bastions of free and independent media” in Hong Kong.

“By silencing independent media, [Chinese] and local authorities are undermining Hong Kong's credibility and viability. A confident government that is not afraid of the truth is committed to a free press,” Blinken said at the time.

Then-Chief Executive Carrie Lam subsequently denied that the media had been targeted and said the release of those arrested violated the rule of law.

Shortly after the raid on Stand News, the independent news channel Citizen News also voluntarily ceased operations due to concerns about the “deteriorating media landscape” in Hong Kong. Four other independent news channels followed suit, according to media regulator Reporters Without Borders, which monitors Hong Kong's media landscape.

In RSF's annual World Press Freedom Index 2019, the city fell from 73rd place among 180 territories and countries in the press freedom ranking to 135th place last year, just ahead of South Sudan.

“The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China, once a bastion of press freedom, has suffered an unprecedented series of setbacks since 2020, when Beijing passed a national security law aimed at silencing independent voices,” the media watchdog said.

The decline is even more pronounced compared to 2002, five years after Hong Kong was handed back to China and the first year in which RSF compiled the index. At that time, Hong Kong was ranked 18th.

Foreign media have also begun to relocate their positions previously based in Hong Kong to South Korea and Taiwan.

The remaining local and international outlets have sometimes run into difficulties.

In 2022, the Hong Kong Foreign Correspondents' Club abolished its Human Rights Press Awards over concerns they might “inadvertently” violate local laws, while plans to award Stand News multiple prizes.

The awards ceremony has now been moved to Taiwan, together with an event for numerous journalists covering East Asia.

Last month, the Wall Street Journal fired Hong Kong reporter Selina Cheng shortly after she was elected president of the Hong Kong Journalists Association. The Journal had reportedly previously asked Cheng to resign from her post or lose her job.

Cheng said the US newspaper told her that its staff “should not be seen as champions of press freedom in a place like Hong Kong.”

The association had previously incurred the wrath of Hong Kong security chief Chris Tang for siding with the protesters in 2019. He also accused the organization of accepting funds from the US government.

The Journal had previously told Al Jazeera that Cheng's position was eliminated when the newspaper moved its Asian headquarters from Hong Kong to Singapore.

Meanwhile, the Hong Kong government has further tightened its sedition laws, which it believes are necessary to prevent the media from “endangering” national security.

In April, the country passed a local version of the national security law, known as Article 23.

The new law introduces several new criminal offenses, including treason, sabotage and espionage. It also allows police to detain suspects for up to 16 days without charge. The term “sedition” has also been added to the law and its scope has been expanded to include “incitement to hatred” against the Chinese Communist Party.

The maximum sentences have been increased from a maximum of two years in prison to seven years, and even to ten years in cases where “external forces” such as foreign governments are involved, according to Amnesty International.

Hong Kong's Chief Executive John Lee said Article 23, which the previous government had to put on hold after mass protests, would help better protect the city from problems such as political unrest, sabotage and foreign infiltration.

The government claimed the provisions were similar to laws passed by Australia, Britain and Singapore to combat covert and overt foreign influence in their political systems.

Regina Ip, a member of the city's pro-Beijing Legislative Council, wrote in an opinion piece in the local South China Morning Post in April that Hong Kong has a “constitutional, legal and moral duty to protect national security” and has failed to fulfill that duty since the legislation was repealed nearly 27 years ago.

“Offences such as treason, sedition, espionage and theft of state secrets have been on our statute books for decades,” she wrote. “But many provisions are ineffective and outdated. For constitutional and practical reasons, Hong Kong needs to update existing laws.”