The New York Times is to shift part of its Hong Kong office to Seoul, the latest sign of the chill spreading in the territory just two weeks after Beijing imposed new national security legislation on it.
The Times said that its employees have faced challenges securing work permits and it plans to move its digital team of journalists, about one-third of its Hong Kong staff, to the South Korean capital over the next year.
The move delivers a blow to the territory’s status as a hub for journalism in Asia, and comes as China and the US have clashed over journalists of each nation working in the other.
Beijing this year said that journalists no longer allowed to work in mainland China could not work in Hong Kong either.
“Given the uncertainty of the moment, we are making plans to geographically diversify our editing staff,” a Times spokeswoman said. “We will maintain a large presence in Hong Kong and have every intention of maintaining our coverage of Hong Kong and China.”
The territory remains a regional media hub, the Hong Kong government said in a statement.
Other international media organizations, such as the Wall Street Journal, the Financial Times and Agence France-Presse, also have their Asia headquarters in Hong Kong.
Reuters moved its Asia headquarters to Singapore in 1997, the year that Britain handed Hong Kong back to China.
In another sign of the legislation’s effect, former Hong Kong lawmaker Au Nok-hin (區諾軒) yesterday said that he was stepping down over Beijing’s accusation that last weekend’s primary he helped organize for the territory’s pro-democracy camp was illegal and could amount to subversion.
Hong Kong, at the time of its handover, was promised a high degree of autonomy that has preserved the territory’s tradition of a freewheeling press and allowed international media to use it for headquarters in Asia.
The new legislation, which prescribes terms of up to life in prison to punish what China broadly defines as secession, subversion, terrorism and collusion with foreign forces, has stoked worries about freedom of speech and the media.
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