Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai testifies for first time in safety trial

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Jimmy Lai, the billionaire former Hong Kong media mogul, testified in his defence for the primary time on Wednesday in a watershed nationwide safety trial that would land him in jail for all times.

Lai, 77, who is without doubt one of the Chinese language territory’s most outstanding democracy champions and a fierce critic of the Chinese language Communist social gathering, mentioned he was motivated by the 1989 Tiananmen Sq. bloodbath to launch a media empire.

“I although it was an excellent alternative for anyone like me, a businessman who made some cash . . . to take part in delivering freedom,” mentioned Lai, who faces prices of colluding with overseas forces and conspiracy to publish seditious materials.

Lai, a British citizen, added that he “at all times oppose[d] violence in any type”, referring to Hong Kong’s 2019 anti-government protests. Authorities have sought to solid Lai as a mastermind of the motion.

He additionally mentioned that the concept of Hong Kong searching for independence from Beijing, as some protesters had advocated, was “too loopy to consider” and “by no means a actuality”.

Lai’s listening to on Wednesday got here at some point after 45 outstanding pro-democracy activists had been sentenced to as much as 10 years in jail in Hong Kong’s greatest nationwide safety trial, which drew condemnation from western governments and human rights teams.

It additionally coincided with a flagship funding summit that introduced a few of the greatest Wall Avenue names to Hong Kong this week. The territory has been combating to revive its popularity as a worldwide monetary hub after Beijing’s political crackdown and coronavirus pandemic restrictions prompted the departure of many overseas companies.

Lai has already spent greater than three years in detention. He was first arrested in 2020 below Beijing’s sweeping nationwide safety regulation, as authorities in Hong Kong cracked down on dissent within the wake of the 2019 protests.

His pro-democracy tabloid, Apple Day by day, one of many metropolis’s largest shops, was compelled to close down the next yr after it was raided by police, its property frozen and senior journalists arrested.

Lai was beforehand sentenced to 5 years and 9 months final yr on separate fraud prices linked to a lease contract for Apple Day by day’s headquarters. He has additionally served a complete of 20 months for his involvement in “unauthorised” anti-government protests and Tiananmen vigils in 2019 and 2020. He faces as much as life imprisonment on the nationwide safety prices.

The prosecution has cited 161 Apple Day by day articles and broadcasts as “seditious” and pointed to Lai’s conferences with US officers, together with former vice-president Mike Pence and secretary of state Mike Pompeo, as proof of collusion with overseas forces. Lai was additionally accused of calling for Washington to impose sanctions on Beijing and Hong Kong.

Lai denied on Wednesday asking Pence or Pompeo to take “motion” towards Hong Kong in 2019, saying he took the conferences simply to “relay” the occasions occurring within the metropolis.

Western governments have denounced the fees. UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer raised the case with China’s President Xi Jinping on the G20 summit in Brazil this week, saying he was “involved” about Lai’s “deteriorating” well being. Final month, Starmer informed parliament the case was a “precedence” for the Labour authorities.

Donald Trump additionally informed a conservative podcast host final month that he would “100 per cent” free Lai if he was elected US president, prompting Hong Kong’s chief John Lee to warn overseas nations towards interfering within the territory.

Greater than 50 folks queued for seats within the courtroom’s public gallery early on Wednesday morning for the 93rd day of Lai’s safety trial, which is being heard with no jury, by a panel of three government-vetted nationwide safety case judges.

The courtroom had initially scheduled 80 days for the trial, however proceedings have been repeatedly delayed. In 2022, Hong Kong authorities moved to dam Lai’s makes an attempt to rent UK barrister Tim Owen to characterize him. Officers argued that overseas attorneys may pose a nationwide safety menace.

Lai’s “due course of rights have been violated repeatedly over the course of [the] long-running trial, together with his proper to pre-trial launch, his proper to a jury trial and his proper to counsel of his personal selecting”, mentioned Thomas Kellogg, government director of Georgetown College’s Middle for Asian Regulation.