Hong Kong's pro-democracy Apple Daily newspaper will publish its final edition on Thursday after police arrested five editors and executives and froze £1.65million in assets.
The paper will stop publishing online from midnight tonight with the final print edition running tomorrow, while the digital version will no longer be accessible after Saturday.
The end of the popular 26-year-old tabloid, which mixes pro-democracy discourse with racy celebrity gossip and investigations of those in power, has escalated alarm over media freedom and other rights in the Chinese-ruled city.
Hong Kong's pro-democracy Apple Daily newspaper will publish its final edition on Thursday after police arrested five editors and executives and froze £1.65million in assets
The paper's newsroom was raided by 200 police in August last year when owner and staunch Beijing critic Jimmy Lai was arrested on suspicion of colluding with foreign forces, and again by 500 police last week when five other executives were detained.
Pictures of police officers sitting at reporters' desks and footage of them loading trucks with journalistic materials have sent chills through the media in the former British colony.
'Thank you to all readers, subscribers, ad clients and Hong Kongers for 26 years of immense love and support. Here we say goodbye, take care of yourselves,' Apple Daily said in an article on its website.
It said the decision was 'based on employee safety and manpower considerations'.
The paper will stop publishing online from midnight tonight with the final print edition running tomorrow
The paper's publisher, Next Digital, said in a statement the decision to close the newspaper, which employs about 600 journalists, was taken 'due to the current circumstances prevailing in Hong Kong'.
Police cited more than 30 articles published by the paper as evidence of an alleged conspiracy to impose foreign sanctions on Hong Kong and China.
It was the freezing of assets that spelled the paper's demise.
The board of directors had earlier this week written to Hong Kong's security bureau requesting the release of some of its funds so that the company could pay wages.
The police operation against Apple Daily drew criticism from the UK, US and EU, which said Hong Kong and Chinese authorities are targeting the freedoms promised to the city when the former British colony was returned to the control of Beijing in 1997.
Police escort chief executive Cheung Kim-hung from the Apple Daily headquarters in Hong Kong last week
