a Hong Kong court today found two former senior editors guilty of sedition in relation to Publications by the now defunct stand news this is the first sedition conviction against journalists since the city's Handover in 1997 mimos I reports John puun former Chief editor of the now defunct online media St news arrived at the district court in one chai after midday the other defendant Patrick lamb a former acting Chief at edor was not present at the hearing due to health reasons after 56 days of trial the court handed down its verdict and a pair were found guilty of sedic JN lamb and the parent company of Stan news were accused of publishing 17 seditions articles to incite hatred towards the Central and Hong Kong government between July 2020 and December 2021 the offers of the Articles include Exile and want activists n for no and tat in judgment George Guin said the political atmosphere was extremely heated when the case happened and a large number of people were not pleased with the Central and local authorities the court rote that 11 out of the 17 articles involved had a sedici intention among them four were written by former journalist Alan o the judge said the content of the 11 articles did not have any objective basis and had the intention to incite public hatred towards the Central and Hong Kong authorities J pu handled 10 of the seditious articles at the chief editor of staning News Patrick lamb dealt with one article when he became the acting Chief editor the C said lamb had made supportive comments on the 2019 social movement the court also convicted the parent company of Stan news because it hired the two defendants meaning the company also helped publish the Sous articles J and N were grounded bail J was seen leaving the courthouse afterwards the two defendants will be sentenced on September 26th Chief superintendent Steve Lee of the National Security Department of the police foret freedom to publish and freedom of the press are not definite and restrictions can be imposed we are not actively to capture all the information from the Press but as far as you know that because the news is going to the public we are not to impose a lot of restriction on them but we are just looking into that rather they have been disseminated the information is a sous in nature that's all all is according to the law senior councel Rony ton who is an executive council member said the convictions of the two editors will likely affect the Public's perception of press freedom but he does not think the verdict will affect press freedom in Hong Kong we should understand that uh it has always been the law that the editor and publisher should be fully responsible for what they publish that is the case before the Handover and after the Handover nature of these articles are arguments commentaries and not report of facts I don't see as a matter of law is anything to do with press freedom