President William Lai (賴清德) yesterday called for the immediate release of Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai (黎智英), who was on Monday sentenced to 20 years in prison for breaching Hong Kong’s National Security Law.
“Taiwan stands with Mr Jimmy Lai and all the people who safeguard freedom,” the president wrote on social media. “We hereby again urge Beijing to immediately release Mr Jimmy Lai and stop pursuing political persecution under the false pretext of enforcing the law.”
The Hong Kong High Court handed 78-year-old Jimmy Lai, founder of the pro-democracy media outlet Next Digital, a 20-year jail term under the National Security Law for “colluding with foreign forces.”
Photo: Chiang Ying-ying, AP
“The ruling again proves that Beijing’s so-called ‘one country, two systems’ scheme exists in name only, and that the judiciary has been degraded to a tool for depriving personal freedom, and curtailing freedom of speech and press freedom,” William Lai wrote.
Hailing Jimmy Lai as a long-time advocate for freedom and democracy, the president said his detention was Beijing’s attempt to create a chilling effect among dissidents and poses a grave threat to the universal values espoused by the international community.
The silencing of Jimmy Lai is also a violation of the Sino-British Joint Declaration of 1984, which promised that the civil liberties of Hong Kong residents would be protected and remain unchanged for 50 years following the territory’s handover to China in 1997, he added.
Civic groups yesterday said that Jimmy Lai’s trial is a wake-up call to Taiwan and the free world, warning that Taiwan should be aware that the Chinese Communist Party’s authoritarian red line would only continue to expand.
China’s cross-border oppression has gone beyond Hong Kong and redefined “foreign forces,” Hong Kong Outlanders secretary-general Sky Fung (馮詔天) said.
The case has demonstrated that press freedom can be arbitrarily defined as “national security threats,” he added.
It also showed how Taiwanese reporters would be treated if Taiwan were to be governed by Chinese authorities, former Apple Daily (Taiwan) reporter Lee Chih-te (李志德) said.
Jimmy Lai’s daughter, Claire Lai (黎采), yesterday condemned her father’s trial as “extremely unfair” and his 20-year prison sentence as “laughable.”
“No one should be under any illusion that the rule of law in Hong Kong still exists,” she said in an interview from the US.
While an appeal remains an option, she said pursuing one could allow the Hong Kong government to argue that the case is still ongoing and that foreign governments therefore should not intervene.
As she sees it, “the only way this can be solved is sovereign to sovereign, not through the Hong Kong courts,” she said, adding that she and her father’s international legal team continue to pursue diplomatic and political efforts to secure his release.
Additional reporting by Fion Khan
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