Apple Daily announced on Wednesday its complete shutdown, signaling that the most hard-core anti-China media entity in Hong Kong will be gone for good. Peace-loving Hong Kong residents, who have undeservedly suffered from the social chaos and division the tabloid helped to incite and precipitate to a large extent, cannot be happier about this news.
Equally if not more important is that many members of the public have gotten clearer about the fact that no individual or institution, regardless of their background, is above the law in Hong Kong, a society under the rule of law.
Apple Daily’s management blames the “suppression of press freedom” for its closure in the same way many criminals would do to escape justice. Its patrons in the West, specifically politicians in Washington and London, sprung to its defense without delay, brandishing also the banner of “freedom of the press”.
But it is naive to believe that they can fool the international community. Apple Daily has run dozens of article seeking foreign interference and sanctions against China and its Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. Attempts to inflict damage to one’s own country and harm to one’s own compatriots are never a right or freedom of any kind but traitorous acts in any society.
Freedom of the press or of expression are also not without restrictions, as stated in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which sanctions the imposition of restrictions on civil rights, including the right to exercise freedom of expression, as long as the restrictions are provided by law, are necessary to protect national security, public order, public health or morals or the rights and freedoms of others. Violations of such restrictions are subject to investigation, prosecution and condign punishment.
And media organizations and their staff are not above the law in any way; they are not spared the legal consequences of any law-breaking actions. Conceivably, this universally accepted principle of “equality before the law” was used by the Australian federal police to justify its raids on the home of then-News Corp journalist Annika Smethurst and the ABC’s Sydney newsroom in June 2019, executing “search warrants related to the publication of stories in 2017 that accused Australia’s special forces in Afghanistan of killing unarmed men and children”, according to The Canberra Times.
Likewise, the media outlets and their staff in Hong Kong, a society under the rule of law, are subject to the same principle of equality before the law. Contrary to what some of them have arrogantly presumed, the Apple Daily cohorts arrested/charged for national security offenses are not immune to the legal consequences of any illegal actions they have allegedly committed under the guise of “freedom of the press”.
If the UN human rights chief and Western politicians genuinely uphold the rule of law as they claim, they should immediately stop making nonsensical statements — about Hong Kong’s law enforcement — which smack of political grandstanding serving to vilify Beijing and the Hong Kong SAR government, and let justice run its course.
Whether those accused of endangering national security by inciting social unrest and colluding with external forces through the Apple Daily platform are guilty should be left to the judgment of the Hong Kong courts, which command the respect of people around the world for administering justice independently and without fear or favor. In the 2020 WJP Rule of Law Index rankings, Hong Kong is ranked 16th out of 128 jurisdictions for its overall rule-of-law performance. The slanderous remarks hurled by anti-China Western politicians and media outlets at Hong Kong’s law enforcement only reflect badly on themselves.
The hypocrisy demonstrated by some Taiwan officials over Hong Kong’s law enforcement action against those Apple Daily executives is equally — if not more — clumsy and disgusting. For example, Democratic Progressive Party veteran and top-ranking government official Joseph Wu Jau-shieh tweeted: “Authoritarianism is waging a brutal war on @appledaily_hk, a desperately endangered symbol of freedom in #HongKong. I’m out of words to describe my anger & sadness at witnessing this tragedy.”
Conspicuously, Wu ignored altogether the fact that Taiwan’s authorities, under the leadership of the Democratic Progressive Party, raided Apple Daily parent company Next Digital’s Taipei offices for the very same reason — "national security" — in 2002. On March 20 of that year, Taiwan authorities raided the offices of Next Digital’s weekly Next Magazine and tried to prevent distribution of an article that revealed details of secret bank accounts allegedly used by the Lee Teng-hui administration to buy influence abroad. Prosecutors later charged reporter Shieh Chung-liang, the article’s author, with “endangering national security”. Huang Ching-lung, editor-in-chief of the Chinese-language daily China Times, was also charged with “endangering national security” after his paper ran a story on the same issue. One can’t help but wonder how Wu managed to keep a straight face when he tweeted those hypocritical words.
The Apple Daily group is not a “fighter for free press” as its foreign patrons and supporters claim. Aside from peddling sensationalism, it has long been a dedicated propaganda platform and rumor mill serving the interests of US-led external forces at the expense of Hong Kong society and foreign businesses based in the city. Its founder and owner, Jimmy Lai Chee-ying, is Washington’s most devoted political pawn in Hong Kong, promoting Washington politicians’ geopolitical agenda against China with his media platform as a tool. He has no qualms about revealing his political mission. In an interview with CNN on Aug 28, 2019, Lai declared: “We in Hong Kong are fighting for the shared values of the US against China; we are fighting their war in the enemy camp.”
That statement speaks volumes for the Apple Daily group pursuing an anti-China political mission in Hong Kong. “Press freedom” is a fig leaf too small to cover conspicuous traitorous acts and machinations.
There is more than enough proof in human history that traitors always pay the ultimate price of turning against their own country for whatever reasons. Responsible freedom of the press will stay intact in Hong Kong after the SAR rids itself of anti-China media entities that serve the interests of external forces at the expense of the well-being of Hong Kong people.
Apple Daily’s closure signals that the pace of replacing chaos with law and order is picking up, and Hong Kong society can look forward to the huge benefits to be brought about by ensuring long-term social harmony and stability.
The author is a current affairs commentator. The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.