HK journalists jailed on mainland: lawyer

BEIJING: Two Hong Kong journalists have been jailed in China for running an "illegal business" that sent political magazines to the mainland, one of their lawyers said on Tuesday, as Beijing cracks down on press freedoms in the semi-autonomous territory.

Publisher Wang Jianmin, 62, was jailed for five years and three months and editor-in-chief Guo Zhongxiao was given two years and three months by the court in Shenzhen, Wang’s lawyer told AFP.

"The two both admitted guilt to the court and said they ‘will not appeal’," said Chen Nansha.

The sentences come after five booksellers from Hong Kong whose publishing house was known for gossipy titles about Chinese political leaders went missing and resurfaced in the mainland last year.

One of the five is still detained and another, who skipped bail and returned to Hong Kong, has revealed how he was blindfolded and interrogated for months during his detention.

Wang and Guo’s magazines are widely available in the former British colony, which has greater freedoms than the mainland under agreements signed with Britain during the 1997 handover. The pair were detained in June 2014, when Shenzhen police said they were "operating an illegal publication".

According to reports at the time of their trial in November, prosecutors said their Hong Kong-registered company National Affairs Limited had earned HK$7 million from publications New Way Monthly and Multiple Face.

But the defence insisted that only eight copies were sent to the mainland, all to friends of the publisher, the South China Morning Post said.