Jimmy Lai trial latest: Hong Kong court to sentence media mogul after national security conviction

Jimmy Lai’s trial has been widely interpreted as a stark indicator of the diminishing press freedom in the former British colony, which reverted to Chinese rule in 1997.

However, the city’s government maintains that the case bears no relation to media freedom.

The impending sentencing is expected to heighten tensions between Beijing and international governments. Lai’s conviction already prompted criticism from the United States and Britain.

In January, Hong Kong's Chief Justice Andrew Cheung addressed the issue, stating that calls for prematurely releasing a defendant based on political causes or identity circumvent legal procedures to ensure accountability and "strike at the very heart of the rule of law itself."

Lai was found guilty of conspiring with others to collude with foreign forces and conspiracy to publish seditious articles.

Eight co-defendants will be sentenced alongside Lai on Monday after pleading guilty to a charge of conspiring to collude with foreign forces.

They include six former Apple Daily executives — publisher Cheung Kim-hung, associate publisher Chan Pui-man, editor-in-chief Ryan Law, executive editor-in-chief Lam Man-chung, and editorial writers Fung Wai-kong and Yeung Ching-kee.

Cheung, Chan and Yeung had earlier testified against their former boss in return for reduced sentences.

The remaining two are former activists Andy Li and Chan Tsz-wah, linked to the international lobby group Stand with Hong Kong, who also testified for the prosecution in exchange for lighter sentences.

Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai will be sentenced on Monday at 10am local timein a closely watched national security trial that has drawn international criticism, including from the US and Britain.

The 78-year-old Briton was found guilty in December of two charges of conspiracy to collude with foreign forces under a China-imposed national security law, as well as a charge of conspiracy to publish seditious material.

Jai, a pro-democracy campaigner and founder of the now-shuttered pro-democracy Apple Daily newspaper, has denied all wrongdoing but faces life in prison.

Chinese president Xi Jinping has expressed strong support for the jailing of British media tycoon Jimmy Lai in Hong Kong, amid mounting international condemnation.

Xi’s first reaction to Monday’s verdict comes just weeks before Sir Keir Starmer is due to travel to Beijing for an important trade visit.

Lai’s trial was closely watched abroad and his conviction has been met with intense criticism by Western governments and rights groups who called it “politically motivated” and “a disgraceful act of persecution”.

A message calling for the release of Jimmy Lai has been projected onto the side of the Houses of Parliament and Tower Bridge.

78-year-old Jimmy Lai, a Hong Kong pro-democracy campaigner and British national, has been in detention for more than five years having been arrested in 2020 under Hong Kong’s new national security law.

Sir Keir Starmer has been accused of failing to secure an assurance that British citizen Jimmy Lai would be released, despite going to China “with the title deeds to a mega-embassy in the back pocket”.

Lord Alton of Liverpool, who had previously been sanctioned by the communist regime, criticised the Prime Minister in Parliament on Monday.

Foreign minister Baroness Chapman of Darlington argued Mr Lai should be freed immediately but said the government would not “get everything we want with one visit”.

Sir Keir headed to China after the government gave the go-ahead to Beijing’s proposed new super-embassy in London, despite security concerns.

During his trip, the Prime Minister raised Mr Lai’s case with Chinese President Xi Jinping.

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Chief Justice Andrew Cheung, Hong Kong's top judge, recently said that calls to free Lai prematurely would undermine the city's rule of law.

"Such demands not only circumvent the legal procedures established to ensure accountability under the law, but also strike at the very heart of the rule of law itself," he said.

My father, Jimmy Lai, was ludicrously found guilty in a politically motivated trial in Hong Kong of trying to destroy the city he made his home in and which he loves.

His vocal dedication to democracy and human rights has been twisted into a violation of the city’s vague and draconian national security law.

As the owner of the largest pro-democracy newspaper in Hong Kong, he was an obvious target for the Chinese Communist Party-backed government, which viewed him as a symbol of what it feared most: dissent.

One of the longest trials in Hong Kong’s history was an unjust legal process; there was no jury, and he was denied the lawyer of his choosing. The law was passed in the summer of 2020, and my father was arrested within weeks, with prosecutors pointing to things he’d done years before.

We knew that this verdict was coming. But we also know that this is not the end of the story. This is the beginning of a new chapter in the campaign for his release.

^{_{The jailing of a British citizen under a draconian national security law should halt any pretence of ‘normal’ relations with China, says Sebastien Lai, son of political prisoner Jimmy Lai. Silence is no longer an option.}}

Sir Keir Starmer has landed in China for the first trip to the country by a UK leader in eight years, telling reporters that he will “raise the issues that need to be raised” with president Xi Jinping.

The prime minister has come under pressure from human rights groups to press for the release of British national Jimmy Lai, a former media tycoon and pro-democracy activist.

Mr Lai is facing a life sentence in prison after a Hong Kong court found him guilty of national security offences last December. He has already spent five years behind bars for his role in Hong Kong’s 2019 pro-democracy protests.

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When police raided the Apple Daily newsroom in 2021, journalists across Hong Kong understood they were watching more than the collapse of a newspaper. They were being shown the future.

A little over four years later, the conviction of the paper’s founder Jimmy Lai on sedition charges has merely formalised that state of affairs. The real impact has long since settled in, embedded in daily decisions about what can be written, who can speak, and how far the press can push in their pursuit of the truth.

What remains of journalism is editors identifying invisible red lines, protecting staff and ensuring their reporting does not expose journalists or sources, while reporters engage in self-censorship to escape harassment and intimidation by the government.

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