Hong Kong arrests booksellers suspected of selling 'seditious' publications

June 24, 2026 11:14 PM EDT

BEIJING, June 25 (Reuters) - Hong ‌Kong police ​have ​arrested two owners of a bookshop suspected of displaying and selling publications with "seditious" content, according to ‌a Hong Kong government statement released on Thursday.

The two ⁠individuals and the bookshop were not identified in the statement. They ‌were arrested on Wednesday.

Here are ‌more details:

• During an enforcement operation in the Sham Shui Po district on Wednesday, the National Security Department ​of the Hong Kong Police Force detained the bookshop owners, a 33-year-old woman and a 32-year-old man, the ⁠government statement said.

• Police investigations showed that the two people were suspected to be ​selling publications including materials inciting hatred against the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Government, the judiciary ​and law enforcement agencies, the statement ‌said.

• The two arrested people are suspected of having received multiple remittances funded by foreign ⁠political organisations, it said.

• Police officers seized a batch of "seditious" items, books and case-related documents from their shop and residence, the ⁠statement said.

• The arrests took place one week before the July 1 ​anniversary of Hong Kong's handover to Chinese rule in 1997. Under Hong Kong's Basic Law, the city is guaranteed a high degree of ‌freedom for 50 years, including freedom of the press.

• In 2020, Beijing imposed a national ‌security law on the city after often violent anti-government protests ⁠a year earlier, sparking ‌international criticism that ​the freedoms promised to the city at the handover are disappearing.

(Reporting by Ryan Woo; Editing by Raju ‌Gopalakrishnan)



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