Hong Kong Bookshop Raided
On March 24, Hong Kong’s National Security Department, established in July 2020 under a national security law China imposed on Hong Kong, arrested four people connected to Book Punch (一拳書館), an independent bookshop in the Sham Shui Po district, on suspicion of “knowingly selling publications with seditious intent” under Article 24 of the Safeguarding National Security Ordinance. Among those detained were the shop’s founder, Pong Yat-ming (龐一鳴), and three female staff members.
Pong, currently standing trial on charges of running an “unregistered school” — for hosting Spanish classes at the bookshop — has already faced legal pressure. A verdict on that case is due on April 10. He was also charged separately with holding a stand-up comedy graduation show without a public entertainment license. Wen Wei Po (文匯報), which has in recent years been used as a tool to attack press and publishing figures that displease the government, had previously accused Book Punch of engaging in “soft resistance” (軟對抗), a term increasingly used by Chinese and Hong Kong officials to describe perceived threats to national security.
The seized materials included a biography of Apple Daily founder Jimmy Lai, who in February received a 20-year sentence for “colluding with foreign forces.” The biography, The Troublemaker, is written by Mark Clifford, a former director of Lai’s Next Digital and editor of the South China Morning Post. Authorities said the book “whitewashed” Lai’s national security convictions and “smeared” Hong Kong’s judiciary and government.
Reporters visiting the shop on Tuesday this week found it shuttered with a handwritten notice reading: “Emergency situation, closed for the day, apologies for the inconvenience,” Points Media (棱角媒體) reported. Clifford, also chairman of the Committee for Freedom in Hong Kong Foundation, called the sedition charge “ironic,” telling Points that freedom of expression “is in the DNA of Hong Kong people.”
This Book Punch raid is the latest in a string of actions targeting Hong Kong’s shrinking independent publishing and bookselling community, a trend that has accelerated since the national security law was imposed in 2020. The arrests follow years of official harassment of Book Punch, including raids and regulatory inspections by six government agencies. Pong and his staff face up to seven years in prison if convicted.
