Hong Kong raids independent bookstores, arrests five in security crackdown

Hong Kong police raided two independent bookstores and arrested five people on suspicion of sedition-related offenses on July 15, 2026. The shops were Have a Nice Stay in Sham Shui Po and Greenfield Bookstore in Mong Kok. Police said the detainees were two men and three women, and that the case began after Hong Kong customs found allegedly seditious books in a shipment from overseas, without naming the titles. Have a Nice Stay, founded by former journalists, had announced the day before that it would close next month because of financial difficulties and "unclear red lines."

The raids landed under Hong Kong’s Safeguarding National Security Ordinance, the city’s Article 23 law, which took effect on March 23, 2024. Official Hong Kong materials say the ordinance was gazetted that day, and the text is now part of the city’s national-security framework. The result is a legal environment in which independent bookstores have become one of the most visible places where national-security policy meets ordinary civic life.

It was the third round of arrests tied to independent bookstores in 2026, after similar police operations in March and June. Amnesty International said Book Punch was raided in March, with four people arrested, and that Hunter Bookstore was raided in June, with two people arrested. One of the June suspects was widely identified as Leticia Wong Man-huen, a former pro-democracy district councillor and bookseller; the Committee to Protect Journalists called for her release and said the arrest of a journalist and bookseller over items sold through an independent bookstore showed how national-security charges were being used against media and literary figures.

The crackdown carries the force of Hong Kong’s best-known bookseller case, the 2015 disappearance of five people linked to Causeway Bay Books, which became a landmark in the city’s publishing history and drew international condemnation. Police have not publicly named the books seized in the July 15 raids, but local reports said the alleged material included publications said to stir hatred against the government, judiciary and law enforcement agencies. Amnesty said the latest raids were another blow to freedom of expression and urged Hong Kong authorities to stop using national-security and sedition laws against peaceful expression. For Hong Kong’s remaining independent booksellers, the latest arrests turned a legal warning into a physical one: the shelf itself has become a point of risk.