The 75 -year -old press magnate, whose newspaper “Apple Daily” was closed in 2021, has already spent almost two years in prison for participating in demonstrations.
MO12345lemonde with AFP
The Hong Kong Press Wizard Jimmy Lai was again sentenced on Saturday December 10 to a sentence of five years and nine months in prison for fraud. Founder of Apple Daily, critical newspaper of Chinese power which was forced to close in 2021, Mr. Lai had just spent twenty months behind bars for his participation in demonstrations and unauthorized rallies.
75 years old, he must still be tried for “collusion with foreign forces”, an offense on the drastic law on national security imposed by Beijing, which is liable to perpetuity prison.
While his previous stays in prison were linked to his role in the pro-democracy demonstrations which rocked Chinese territory in 2019, the case for which he was sentenced on Saturday concerns the violation of the rental conditions of the offices of His diary. Mr. Lai and Wong Wai-Keung, a former manager of Apple Daily, were found guilty of fraud in October in what Judge Stanley Chan described as a plan “planned, organized and which lasted years”.
“do no connection with politics,” said the judge
The prosecutors said that a consulting company managed by Mr. LAI for its personal use had occupied offices rented by Apple Daily for publication and printing purposes. According to them, this was a violation of the rental conditions signed with a government company and equivalent to fraud. For their part, the defense lawyers had argued that the case should have been the subject of a civil rather than criminal trial, adding that the area concerned was minimal. Mr. Wong, 61, was sentenced to 21 months in prison.
“Make no connection with politics,” said the judge, insisting that the case had nothing to do with press freedom. Jimmy Lai, one of the leading figures of the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong, has long been opposed to the Beijing authorities. For years, his newspaper criticized the Chinese power before being forced to close mid-2021 after a frost of its funds and the arrest of some of its executives and its founder.