The report comes a year after five Hong Kong book publishers were detained by Chinese authorities, with some abducted and whisked across borders from Thailand and Hong Kong and held incommunicado for months. Book stores specialising in political material in downtown Hong Kong also saw a raft of closings. Earlier this year at the Hong Kong book fair, the premiere event in the city’s literary calendar, there was a notable decline of stalls carrying political and ‘banned” works. While titles that cannot find a Hong Kong publisher are usually still released in nearby Taiwan, publishers there complained that very few in Hong Kong are willing to distribute the books, the report said. PEN America decried the weak response from the Hong Kong authorities and the British and Swedish governments for not doing enough to protect their citizens, accusing the international community of prioritising business ties over human rights.

Source: The Guardian November 07, 2016 01:29 UTC