The 75-year-old has long been openly critical of Beijing.
Hong Kong media magnate Jimmy Lai was again sentenced on Saturday December 10 to five years and nine months in prison for fraud. Founder of theApple Daily, a newspaper critical of Chinese power which was forced to close, Jimmy Lai had recently spent twenty months behind bars for his participation in demonstrations and unauthorized gatherings. Aged 75, he is yet to be tried soon for “collusion with foreign forces“, a violation of the drastic national security law imposed by Beijing which is punishable by life imprisonment.
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Jimmy Lai and Wong Wai-Keung, a former executive ofApple Daily had already been convicted of fraud in October in what Judge Stanley Chan described as a plan “planned, organized and that lasted for years“. Prosecutors said a consulting firm run by Jimmy Lai for his personal use occupied offices rented by Apple Dailyfor publishing and printing purposes. This was, they claimed, a violation of rental terms signed with a government company and amounted to fraud.
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For their part, the defense lawyers had argued that the case should have been the subject of a civil rather than a criminal trial, adding that the area concerned was minimal. The judge blamed theApple Daily of having abused its reputation as a well-known media to make it a “protective shieldwhich prevented the landlord from acting in the event of a violation of the terms of the lease.
Jimmy Lai, one of the leading figures of the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong, has long been openly critical of Beijing. For years, his newspaper criticized Chinese power before being forced to close in mid-2021 after its funds were frozen and some of its executives and its founder were arrested.