Cease threats against Foreign Correspondents’ Club, press groups tell former Hong Kong leader CY Leung
In his latest attack, Leung Chun-ying says the FCC should make public its lease agreement so other ‘deserving organisations’ can bid for its premises
International and local press groups urged Hong Kong’s former leader Leung Chun-ying on Tuesday to stop threatening the city’s Foreign Correspondents’ Club over its lease of a government-owned building, as he continued his barrage of criticism against it.
In a post on Facebook that was also circulated via email, Leung said he believed the rental of the FCC building on Ice House Street in Central was a “special deal with the government” and called on the club to disclose the full lease.
“Once the full terms and conditions of the lease are known, other organisations with equally deserving causes as the FCC’s could bid for the lease. The FCC has no monopoly,” he said, a day after challenging the club to give up its lease and bid for the premises in the open market.
The former chief executive has been highly critical of the FCC’s refusal to cancel an August 14 talk at its premises by separatist party leader Andy Chan Ho-tin despite a request from Beijing to do so.
On Tuesday, the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) described Leung’s remarks as an attempt to “muzzle and publicly threaten an organisation that strongly defends the media’s role to hear from all areas of society and politics”.
“The IFJ strongly urges Leung to retract the open letter and the threats made on the FCC over the right to occupy its current premises,” Jane Worthington, acting director of the IFJ in Asia Pacific, said.
The director of Reporters Without Borders’ East Asia bureau, Cédric Alviani, said Leung’s comments were “totally out of place and only shows that Leung runs out of arguments to justify the Chinese censorship attempt”.