United Kingdom expresses alarm over missing booksellers

Lee Bo, part owner of Causeway Bay Books, was reported missing Friday by his wife, who said her last contact with him was from a telephone number from Shenzhen, across the mainland border.

More than a month before he went missing last weekend, Hong Kong bookseller Lee Bo, whose store publishes titles critical of the Communist Party leadership, expressed confidence that no harm would come to him as long as he stayed in the city and did not venture onto the mainland.

“We are deeply concerned by reports about the disappearance and detention of individuals associated with the Causeway Bay Books bookstore in Hong Kong”, said the spokesperson, according to a statement from the British embassy in Beijing.

Police confirmed Tuesday Lee’s wife had retracted a report on her husband’s disappearance, a move Amnesty said smacked of “intimidation”. But, under the Hong Kong law only the subject of a missing person report can cancel it.

Gui Minhai, a Swedish national and co-owner of the Mighty Current failed to return from a holiday in Thailand in October, while three other associates disappeared when they were visiting southern China, reports said. In this free-wheeling, specially-administered corner of China, several publishing houses & bookshops have spent years of time of time churning out books banned on the Chinese language mainland.

The case prompted small groups of protesters to march in Hong Kong on Sunday.

Mr Lee is the most recent bookseller after raising the alarm of his co-workers at publishing house Really Present, who vanished in October to go lost.

He acknowledged rumours that mainland authorities had abducted Lee, who was last seen on Wednesday, but told reporters there was no indication of this.

Human rights activists who have been advocating for the Lee family say they believe the letter is genuine.

Lee Bo, a shareholder of the Causeway Bay Books, went missing on December 30. The government’s sanction of a weakening yuan is exacerbating a deteriorating earnings outlook for Hong Kong dollar-priced shares as the economy slows.

“We would hope that wherever Mr. Lee is, if he is charged with any offences, those offences would be tried in Hong Kong”.

“Only legal enforcement agencies in Hong Kong have the legal authority to enforce laws in Hong Kong”, he said. In a news conference, Hong Kong’s chief executive, Leung Chun-ying, said that only local authorities could enforce the law under “One Country, Two Systems” framework. Often derided as a puppet of the party in Beijing, Mr Leung appeared to stand up for Hong Kong’s autonomy by saying that any unauthorised encroachment by mainland agents would be an “unacceptable” breach of the Basic Law, the territory’s mini-constitution.

The New York Times says Mighty Current has written, published and marketed a series of books highly critical of Chinese politicians.

If Chinese authorities kidnapped Lee from Hong Kong, they will have encroached on its independence.

Foreign minister Wang Yi did not reply directly when asked whether China had detained the booksellers, but said policy towards Hong Kong remained “unchanged”.

“Although the… bookstore is based in Hong Kong, it maintains itself by causing trouble in the mainland”.

Their disappearances have prompted fears that Beijing is eroding the “one country, two systems principle” that’s been in place since Britain ceded control in 1997 and that grants Hong Kong civil liberties nonexistent on the mainland, including freedom of the press.

The Chinese foreign ministry in Beijing said it had no information on the case.