HK tycoon Jimmy Lai’s Apple Daily newsroom raided by 500 officers over national security law

HONG KONG, June 17 (Reuters) - Five hundred Hong Kong police officers sifted through reporters’ computers and notebooks at pro-democracy tabloid Apple Daily on Thursday, the first case in which authorities have cited media articles as potentially violating the national security law.

Around dawn, police arrested five executives of the newspaper, and officers were later seen sitting at computers in the newsroom after entering with a warrant to seize journalistic materials, including from reporters' phones and laptops.

The raid is the latest blow to media tycoon Jimmy Lai, the tabloid's owner and a staunch Beijing critic, whose assets have been seized under the security law and who is serving prison sentences for taking part in illegal assemblies.

In comments raising further alarm over media freedoms in Hong Kong, Security Secretary John Lee described the newsroom as a "crime scene" and said the operation was aimed at those who use reporting as a "tool to endanger" national security.

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