Hong Kong police arrest five in bookstore sedition raids
Police said five people were held after raids on two Mong Kok bookstores suspected of displaying and selling seditious publications.
By Lucas Ferreira · Science & Environment Writer
3 min read
Hong Kong police arrested five people after raiding two bookstores in the Mong Kok district, expanding a series of cases against independent booksellers under the city’s security laws. Police said the suspects were accused of displaying and selling publications deemed seditious.
Local media identified the shops as Have A Nice Stay, a bookstore founded by former journalists, and Greenfield Book Store. Police said in a statement that two men and three women were arrested on suspicion of violating the 2024 national security law, but did not name the stores.
Images and video carried by several media outlets showed officers in police-marked vests removing boxes from the building where Have A Nice Stay operates. A bookseller was also seen being taken away, according to those reports.
Online outlet The Collective published video showing boxes being removed from the building that houses Greenfield Book Store, a few streets away. Both shops were shut during normal business hours Wednesday, and calls to Greenfield and to a founder of Have A Nice Stay were not answered, according to the Associated Press.
Police cite overseas shipment
Police said customs officials referred the case after finding books they considered seditious in a shipment sent to Hong Kong from overseas. Authorities did not identify the titles.
The police statement said investigators suspected the five arrested people of keeping seditious materials on site and selling seditious publications. Police said the materials included content meant to stir hatred toward Hong Kong’s government, courts and law enforcement agencies.
The raids mark the third set of arrests linked to independent bookstores this year, after similar cases in March and June. In those earlier actions, police arrested the owner and staff of the independent Book Punch store and later arrested two other booksellers; all were released on bail, according to the Associated Press.
Have A Nice Stay had already said it planned to close on Aug. 30. In a social media post, the shop cited financial problems and an uncertain “red line” among the reasons for the decision.
Book trade under pressure
Hong Kong had long been known for broad freedom to publish and sell politically sensitive books, including titles that some mainland Chinese readers crossed the border to buy. The situation for independent bookstores has become more difficult since political changes followed the 2019 anti-government protests, the Associated Press reported.
One of the best-known cases involving the city’s book trade centered on Lam Wing-kee, the former owner of Causeway Bay Books, who died earlier this month. Lam drew international attention in 2016 when he said Chinese authorities had held him after he crossed from Hong Kong into Shenzhen; four other people linked to the bookstore had disappeared in late 2015.
His account alarmed many in Hong Kong, where Beijing had promised that civil liberties would remain in place for 50 years after the former British colony returned to Chinese rule in 1997.
Hong Kong authorities have defended the city’s national security laws as necessary for stability. Security Secretary Chris Tang has said the government would not create a list of banned books, saying such a system would be impractical.
This story draws on original reporting from NPR.