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New protest-themed book pulled from Hong Kong book fair as publishers fear national security law

蘋果日報 2020/06/22 22:20


A new book about Hong Kong’s ongoing protests will not be sold at the city’s annual book fair next month amid “white terror” created by a looming national security law, insiders of the publishing sector have said.
The Hong Kong Book Fair, to be held between July 15 and 21, may well be taking place for the first time under the new national security law, which is being drawn up by Beijing and could be enacted as early as the end of June.
Publishers have acknowledged the draft law is casting a chilling effect on their industry as the wording is as yet unclear.
One industry player, known only as Y, told Apple Daily that a well-known publisher had halted the publication of a new book about the protests, out of fear of the impending legislation.
“I asked if the book was about Hong Kong independence. The publisher denied and said it was only an analysis of the protests,” he said.
Y said his company did not have plans for new political books and would continue selling those published in the past. “I don’t know what it means by ‘sensitive’ as there is no standard. I can’t speculate too much.”
He said the upcoming law had brought to mind an incident in 2015, when five booksellers of Causeway Bay Books disappeared and later resurfaced in custody in mainland China after publishing books which talked about Chinese President Xi Jinping. Y said he expected that books about Hong Kong matters would still be published for a while, bar any mention of Hong Kong independence.
There had been calls online for pro-Beijing protesters to demonstrate at the book fair and publicly expose titles about Hong Kong independence. Y slammed the calls as being akin to the “Cultural Revolution” and believed that the publishing sector would suffer under tighter control.
He said he would try his best to publish political books but admitted he might give up if doing so meant imprisonment.
Jimmy Pang of the Subculture publishing company told Apple Daily that the looming law had created a sense of white terror clouding publishing freedom. He expected that publishers would hesitate to put political books on sale at the book fair, such as those about the 1989 Tiananmen massacre and the late Nobel Peace Prize winner Liu Xiaobo.
“The so-called red line is set by Beijing. If they decide that you have violated the law, then you have,” he said.
Pang said his company had never done anything illegal and would continue to publish political books, including those penned by hosts of Headliner, a satire news program regularly under fire from Beijing loyalists. He also vowed to republish his classic book, first printed in 2000, criticizing then-chief executive Tung Chee-wah.
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