Press Freedom
CPJ Updates
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- 2024 is deadliest year for journalists in CPJ history; almost 70% killed by Israel
- In record year, China, Israel, and Myanmar are world’s leading jailers of journalists
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- No justice for journalists targeted by Israel despite strong evidence of war crime
- On Edge: What the US election could mean for journalists and global press freedom
- Forced to flee: Exiled journalists face unsafe passage and transnational repression
- Israel-Gaza war brings 2023 journalist killings to devastating high
- 2023 prison census: Jailed journalist numbers near record high; Israel imprisonments spike
Reporter Without Borders
OPC Calls for Release of Jimmy Lai in Hong Kong
NEW YORK, August 15, 2025 – The Overseas Press Club of America joins with other press organizations in calling for the release of Jimmy Lai in Hong Kong, as his national security trial resumed in Hong Kong High Court. Lai, 77, the owner of the former Apple Daily newspaper and an advocate for press freedom and human rights in the Chinese-ruled territory, has been jailed since December 2020 — reportedly most of the time in solitary confinement.
Closing arguments in the trial are set to resume Monday after the court adjourned Friday, due to concerns regarding Lai’s health.
Lai was charged with foreign collusion under Hong Kong’s wide-ranging National Security Law — which Beijing imposed on the semi-autonomous territory in July 2020 after the sometimes violent protests in Hong Kong in 2019. The collusion offense could carry a life prison sentence. As publisher of the pro-democracy newspaper, Lai was also charged with “seditious publication” as a result of 161 opinion pieces he was charged to have written for the newspaper.
According to Reporters Without Borders, Lai’s treatment “exposes the authorities’ ruthless determination to silence and suppress one of the most prominent advocates for press freedom amid Hong Kong’s rapidly deteriorating media landscape.”
The OPC joins other press and human rights organizations calling for the release of the 77-year-old former newspaper publisher, who newsroom was raided in 2020 and subsequently shut down for printing pro-democracy articles. Journalism is not a crime and Jimmy Lai has been held for too long. The evidence in his trials shows only that he was committed to free speech — which has been criminalized under the National Security Law.