Suppression of Free Speech in Hong Kong

Independent Hong Kong news site Citizen News says it will shut down on Tuesday, citing the deteriorating media environment in the city and the need to protect its staff. Citizen News was the largest remaining independent news outlet in Hong Kong following the shuttering of Apple Daily in June and Stand News last Wednesday. The news outlet announced the decision on Facebook, saying it was made to protect the safety of everyone involved. "Unfortunately, the major changes in our society in the last two years, and the deteriorating media environment, have made it impossible for us to realize our mission without worries," it wrote. "At the centre of a brewing storm, we found ourself in a critical situation. In the face of a crisis, we must ensure the safety and well-being of everyone who are on board.” Citizen News was founded in 2017 by a number of veteran Hong Kong reporters and is supported entirely by crowdfunding. The statement said its website will cease to be updated from Tuesday and will be removed "after a period of time." Since Beijing imposed a sweeping national security law in Hong Kong in 2020, pro-democracy groups have dissolved, activists and journalists have been arrested, and independent media outlets have shut down. Last summer, Apple Daily, Hong Kong's largest pro-democracy publication, closed after the arrests of multiple journalists and the freezing of millions of dollars of assets under the national security law. And Stand News shuttered after police raided its office last Wednesday, arrested seven people associated with the publication and froze about 61 million Hong Kong dollars ($7.8 million) worth of assets from the company. While an initial government notice referenced a "conspiracy to publish seditious publications" — allegations that stem from a colonial-era crimes ordinance — the police involved with the Stand News case were national security officers. Police said the arrests were connected to multiple "seditious" articles published by the outlet between July 2020 and November 2021. Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam defended the raid, claiming it had nothing to do with what they wrote. "This was purely enforcement work. This has nothing to do with journalistic or media work," Lam said Thursday. — By CNN's Eric Cheung and Tara John ---------- Around Asia ---------- An unidentified man who crossed the heavily armed border from South Korea into North Korea on Sunday is presumed to be a North Korean defector who made the journey in the opposite direction more than a year ago, according to the South Korean Defense Ministry. North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has again admitted there is a "food problem" in the country, during a speech which brought an important five-day meeting of his Korean Worker's Party to a close. Seven states in Malaysia were hit by floods on Sunday and thousands of people were evacuated, taking the total affected by heavy rain in the past two weeks to more than 125,000. A stampede at one of India's holiest shrines left at least 12 people dead on New Year's Day, a local official said.