The trial is part of the punishment. Jimmy Lai, former mogul, former publisher of the Hong Kong pro-democracy newspaper Apple Daily, a defender of Hong Kong’s protests against the Chinese Communist Party, is being subjected to a CCP show trial intended to punish him further for fighting the good fight.
Unique place
We hear that “Hong Kong’s Jimmy Lai calls Taiwan ‘unique country’, denies backing independence” (South China Morning Post, January 6, 2025).
“I think Taiwan will be a very unique country, you know,” he said in the show dated October 1, 2020.
Madam Justice Esther Toh Lye-ping suggested Lai was offering his support for an independent Taiwan through that characterisation. The ex-media boss denied the idea but acknowledged he could have phrased it better.
“Well, maybe there’s a better word to use it—maybe a ‘place’—but as I defined earlier, Taiwan cannot be a sovereign country,” he told the court.
Seems less than completely candid.
Sensible words that Jimmy Lai uttered or wrote while still a free man in Hong Kong (in the sense of not being imprisoned) were quoted against him in court.
In the same Apple Daily article, Lai urged the United States to adopt a “clear and unyielding” stance in protecting Taiwan, saying that Chinese “dictator” Xi Jinping could decide to invade the island at any time depending on the political situation at hand.
“The most effective strategy to prevent war is to always be prepared for one,” Lai added.
Both things can be true, i.e., that Lai wants Taiwan to be left alone and that he doesn’t think it is a country. I doubt it.
What if Jimmy Lai had instead said, “I don’t know how there can be any question here about independence or sovereignty. The Republic of China, Taiwan if you will, is already independent and self-governing. It doesn’t have to ‘become’ independent. Next question.”
No options
The Chinese Communist Party cannot extend Lai’s time in prison to a length greater than the rest of his life, the preordained sentence for the preordained verdict. But his jailers could find many ways to make his final years more miserable. If we were in his position, we too would be keeping this fact in mind. Yet Lai is also sticking to many publicly recorded positions that he knows do not endear him to the Party. Some of his testimony that contradicts CCP catechisms are being quoted in public reports.
Lai cannot escape no matter how he walks any tightrope in court. Even if he were to insist that “I love the Chinese Communist Party now. I repent in dust and ashes,” which he never would, the Party would not let him go.
Xi Jinping et al. know that if they were to release him, as soon as he could get away from Hong Kong and get his bearings, Jimmy Lai would become much clearer and much more forthright.
Also see:
Acton Institute: Video: “The Hong Konger: Jimmy Lai’s Extraordinary Struggle for Freedom”
Acton Institute: Video: “Jimmy Lai’s Fight For Freedom Continues | Panel Discussion”
