Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam says the government is studying legislation to tackle fake news. The move is widely seen as a further crackdown on press freedom as the authorities push ahead with a national security law.
Mrs. Lam was asked about the government’s progress in legislating against fake news during a press conference before the Executive Council on Tuesday (May 4, 2021). She responded that the government still needs to do a lot of research in this area and will make reference to how foreign countries deal with fake news and the publication of incitement and hate speech, and that there is no timetable for legislation yet. But she stressed that the government continues to take the issue seriously, as fake news hurts many people.
Earlier, Hong Kong Police Commissioner Tang Ping-keung had criticized Apple Daily’s handling of news images without naming names, and made it clear that the police support legislation to tackle fake news.
Apple Daily is a newspaper known for its criticism of Beijing and Hong Kong authorities. The founder of a media group to which the newspaper belongs, Lai Chi-ying, has been arrested and jailed for allegedly violating Hong Kong’s national security laws.
Photo: Hong Kong media group founder Lai Chi-ying leaves the Court of Final Appeal (AFP, February 9, 2021)
A spokesman for the media union, Lam Wai-chung, said it should not be up to the government to decide unilaterally whether news is true or false, and that the law banning fake news could easily be used by those in power to suppress dissenting voices.
Hong Kong Journalists Association President Yeung Kin-hing also said that the police chief’s pegging of the handling of news images to fake news shows that fake news allegations can be used as a weapon against the media, limiting the freedom the media should enjoy.
On Monday, the Hong Kong Journalists Association (HKJA) released the results of its latest “Press Freedom Index”, which showed that most journalists and the public believe that Beijing’s implementation of the Hong Kong version of the National Security Law has undermined press freedom in Hong Kong, and 85 percent of the journalists surveyed agreed that the Hong Kong government is the source of the suppression of press freedom.
Hong Kong was once seen as a bridgehead for Western press freedom values in Asia. After Beijing imposed the state security law in Hong Kong last June, the space for press freedom there has shrunk dramatically.
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