China flexes muscles with raid, arrests
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China imposes sanctions on US lawmakers over Hong Kong
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HK police raid pro-democracy newspaper office, arrest owner
Hong Kong pro-democracy media tycoon Jimmy Lai was arrested yesterday and led in handcuffs through his newspaper office as police raided the building, part of a sweeping crackdown on dissent since China imposed a security law on the city.
China also imposed sanctions on 11 US citizens including legislators in response to the US imposition of sanctions on 11 Hong Kong and Chinese officials accused of curtailing political freedoms in the former British colony. Among those targeted were Senators Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Tom Cotton, Josh Hawley and Pat Toomey and Representative Chris Smith, as well as individuals at non-profit and rights groups.
"In response to that wrong US behaviour, China has decided to impose sanctions on individuals who have behaved egregiously on Hong Kong-related issues," Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian told a regular press briefing yesterday.
He did not specify what the sanctions entail.
Lai, 71, was among nine people detained on charges including colluding with foreign forces -- one of the new national security offences -- and fraud in an operation targeting his Next Digital publishing group.
It was the latest police operation against dissidents under the sweeping new law introduced at the end of June.
Two of Lai's sons were among those detained, a police source told AFP as well as Wilson Li, a former pro-democracy activist who describes himself as a freelance videographer working for Britain's ITV News.
The most serious national security crimes carry up to life in jail.
Journalists working at Lai's Apple Daily broadcasted dramatic footage on Facebook of some 200 police officers conducting the raid, and the newspaper's chief editor Law Wai-kwong demanding a warrant from officers.
Apple's staff were ordered to leave their seats and line up so police could check their identities as officers conducted searches across the newsroom.
Police said the search was conducted with a court warrant which was shown to staff.
The Foreign Correspondents' Club, Hong Kong said the raid signalled "a dark new phase" that "upended" previous assurances by China and Hong Kong's government that the national security law would not end press freedoms.
The security law was introduced in a bid to quell last year's huge and often violent pro-democracy protests, and authorities have since wielded their new powers to pursue the city's democracy camp, sparking criticism from Western nations.
Lai's Apple Daily and Next Magazine are unapologetically pro-democracy and critical of Beijing. China routinely calls Lai a "traitor" and a "black hand" behind last year's protests.
Critics, including many Western nations, believe the law has ended the key liberties and autonomy that Beijing promised Hong Kong could keep after its 1997 handover by Britain.
The United States on Friday imposed sanctions on Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam as well as the city's current and former police chiefs, under an executive order signed by President Donald Trump.
Last month, China announced sanctions against Cruz, Rubio, Smith and other U.S. officials after the United States penalized senior Chinese officials over the treatment of Uighur Muslims in its Xinjiang region.
Beijing's latest measure includes sanctions against the heads of five US-based, non-government organisations - the National Endowment for Democracy, the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs, the International Republican Institute, Freedom House and Human Rights Watch.
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