HK media mogul Jimmy Lai convicted under Beijing-imposed national security law

Former Hong Kong media mogul Jimmy Lai has been found guilty of conspiracy to collude with foreign forces under a Beijing-imposed national security law, following a landmark trial that was widely criticised by democracy advocates as an attack on the rule of law in the global financial hub.

Lai, 78, faces potential life imprisonment after he was found guilty by three judges in Hong Kong’s High Court on two counts of conspiracy to commit foreign collusion.

He was also found guilty of one count of “conspiracy to publish seditious publications” under a colonial-era sedition law in connection with Apple Daily, the now-closed Chinese-language newspaper he founded in 1995.

An outspoken critic of the Chinese Communist Party and vocal democracy campaigner, Lai has spent much of the past five years in solitary confinement after he was arrested in August 2020 as part of Beijing’s crackdown on anti-government protests that swept through Hong Kong in 2019.

“There is no doubt” that Lai “had harboured his resentment and hatred of” China for many of his adult years, Judge Esther Toh told a packed courtroom as the tycoon, wearing a pale green jumper and a grey jacket, sat with his arms folded.

Reading from an 855-page verdict, Toh said the court was satisfied that Lai was the mastermind of the conspiracies and that the only reasonable inference from the evidence was that his intent was to seek the downfall of the ruling Communist Party even at the sacrifice of the people of China and Hong Kong.

His case was heard without a jury, as per all national security cases, in a significant departure from Hong Kong’s common law tradition.

Lai’s lawyer, Robert Pang, said his client had yet to decide whether to appeal against the verdict.

Lai will be sentenced at a later date. His legal team can plead for leniency at a pre-sentencing hearing scheduled for January 12. His supporters have raised ongoing concerns about his deteriorating health due to diabetes and high blood pressure while incarcerated.

Apple Daily was a prominent pro-democracy tabloid that was stridently critical of the Chinese and Hong Kong governments. It closed in 2021 after authorities froze Lai’s bank accounts and arrested key staff members.

In his testimony during the trial, Lai said Apple Daily embodied the core values of Hong Kong: “rule of law, freedom, pursuit of democracy, freedom of speech, freedom of religions, freedom of assembly”.

He is the most high-profile target of the national security law, which has been used by Hong Kong authorities to arrest hundreds of pro-democracy figures, opposition politicians, journalists and academics, crushing political dissent in the city.

In November 2024, 45 democracy campaigners, including Australian man Gordon Ng, were jailed for subversion for their involvement in a plan to run opposition candidates in an unofficial primary election in July 2020.

Lai’s arrest and long-running trial have drawn criticism from Western governments, including Australia’s, while human rights campaigners have argued the case symbolises the decline of media freedom and judicial independence in the former British colony, which returned to Chinese rule in 1997.

The verdict against him is also a test for Beijing’s diplomatic ties. US President Donald Trump said he has raised the case with China, and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has said his government has made it a priority to secure the release of Lai, who is a British citizen.

“This verdict should surprise absolutely no one,” the Committee for Freedom in Hong Kong Foundation’s UK and Europe director, Mark Sabah, said.

“The trial against Jimmy Lai has been a grotesque exercise in legal subversion and chicanery – a show trial masquerading as justice. But what’s actually been on display is the complete and total destruction of Hong Kong’s reputation as a global legal centre.”

Human Rights Watch said Lai’s conviction “on bogus charges” was “both cruel and a travesty of justice” and called on foreign governments to urge his immediate release.

“The Chinese and Hong Kong governments should pay a cost for their unrelenting efforts to muzzle Hong Kong’s press,” Elaine Pearson, the organisation’s Asia director, said in a statement.

Hong Kong authorities have repeatedly rejected claims that the city’s rule of law has been degraded by the national security law and have defended Lai’s prosecution.

During Lai’s 156-day trial, prosecutors accused him of conspiring with senior executives of Apple Daily and others to request foreign forces impose sanctions or blockades and engage in other hostile activities against Hong Kong or China.

The prosecution also accused Lai of making such requests, highlighting his meetings with former US vice president Mike Pence and former secretary of state Mike Pompeo in July 2019 at the height of the protests.

In addition, it presented 161 publications, including Apple Daily articles, to the court as evidence of conspiracy to publish seditious materials, as well as social media posts and text messages.

Lai’s conviction comes weeks after a devastating fire ripped through an apartment complex in Hong Kong, killing at least 160 people. As public outrage simmered to the surface, Hong Kong authorities used the national security law to clamp down on calls for accountability, arresting several people for criticising the government’s response.

Election for the city’s Legislative Council, held on December 7, drew the second-lowest turnout on record – a sign of the public’s disengagement from a political process that was overhauled by Beijing to ensure a “patriots”-only system of government which excluded pro-democracy candidates from running.

With wires

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