Press Release
Immediate
30-11-2022
The Association of Overseas Hong Kong Media Professionals stands with China’s brave citizens who are demanding an end to oppressive restrictions on the freedom of movement imposed by the Chinese Communist Party pursuing its failed and discredited ‘Covid zero’ policy.
It is clear why protestors are demanding transparency from the government and freedom of the press to fully report the situation in China. The people on the streets understand how the PRC’s dictatorship and war on freedom of expression are linked to the growing social and economic crisis produced by the Communist Party’s determination to pursue its own interests over those of their citizens.
It is lamentably also the case that the Hong Kong authorities have moved rapidly to clamp down on expressions of sympathy for the protests in the Mainland where tactics employed by Hong Kong’s democracy movement have been emulated.
We demand that the Chinese authorities cease their crackdown on citizens trying to access information at this crucial time.
We demand an apology for the violent arrest and beating in Shanghai of Ed Lawrence, a BBC journalist, on 29 November and other restrictions being placed on media reporting. In attacking working journalists the regime exposes its fear of media coverage. Moreover we demand the release of Zhang Zhan, jailed for four years for her reporting of the outbreak of the virus in Wuhan.
What is happening in China right now, yet again, clearly shows why press freedom matters in a society under totalitarian rule.
The Chinese people fighting oppression do not stand alone.
For media enquiries in Chinese or English email: info@aohkmp.org.uk
Ends
Press release can download here.
Editor’s Note
The AOHKMP, launched in October 2022, is an association of media professionals who have worked in Hong Kong and are now living overseas where, unlike their colleagues still in the territory, they are free to defend press freedom.