{"id":27541,"date":"2025-12-15T15:46:53","date_gmt":"2025-12-15T07:46:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/amnestyhk.org\/en-us\/?p=27541"},"modified":"2026-04-25T00:36:05","modified_gmt":"2026-04-24T16:36:05","slug":"conviction-of-jimmy-lai-sounds-death-knell-for-press-freedom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/amnestyhk.org\/en-us\/conviction-of-jimmy-lai-sounds-death-knell-for-press-freedom\/","title":{"rendered":"Conviction of Jimmy Lai sounds death knell for press freedom"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

QUOTE<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

15 December 2025<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Responding to today\u2019s conviction of Hong Kong newspaper founder Jimmy Lai on national security charges, Amnesty International\u2019s China Director Sarah Brooks said:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe predictability of today\u2019s verdict does not make it any less dismaying \u2013 the conviction of Jimmy Lai feels like the death knell for press freedom in Hong Kong, where the essential work of journalism has been rebranded as a crime.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cLai has been jailed simply because he and his Apple Daily newspaper criticized the government. The activities for which he has been convicted would never have been considered crimes before the 2020 National Security Law was enacted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBut this verdict shows that Hong Kong\u2019s so-called \u2018national security\u2019 laws are not in place to protect people, but to silence them. It should also serve as a warning to all people doing business in Hong Kong: that pursuing opportunities in the city comes with severe legal risks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis verdict is not just about one man; it is the latest step in a systematic crackdown on freedom of expression in Hong Kong: targeting not only protests and political parties, but the very idea that people can \u2013 indeed, should \u2013 hold power to account. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cJimmy Lai is a prisoner of conscience, jailed solely for peacefully exercising his right to freedom of expression, and he must be immediately and unconditionally released. The law that has been used to target him, and so many others, must be internationally condemned for what it is: a cover for the authorities in Beijing and Hong Kong to carry on their crackdown.\u201d
 
Background
Hong Kong\u2019s High Court today found pro-democracy activist Jimmy Lai guilty of two counts of conspiracy to commit collusion with foreign forces and one count of conspiracy to commit sedition. He faces a maximum sentence of life imprisonment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lai was charged with \u201ccollusion with a foreign country or external elements\u201d under the Beijing-imposed National Security Law (NSL) on 11 December 2020. He has been continuously detained since 31 December 2020. He was later charged with two more counts of \u201cconspiracy to collude with a foreign country or external elements\u201d under the NSL, and one more count of \u201cconspiracy to publish seditious publications\u201d under the Crimes Ordinance.
 
Hong Kong authorities said the charges related to the publication of articles in Apple Daily, a newspaper owned by Lai, that called on foreign countries to impose sanctions. Authorities also cited Lai\u2019s meetings with US politicians and interviews with overseas media, his Twitter (now X) posts and his list of followers on the platform which included prominent foreign politicians and NGOs supportive of the pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lai, a British national, was denied bail in February 2021 when Hong Kong\u2019s highest court ruled that National Security Law cases were an exception to the presumption in favour of bail. The Hong Kong government also prohibited Lai\u2019s British lawyer Timothy Owen from representing him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jimmy Lai founded the outspoken Apple Daily in 1995. Shortly after the National Security Law was introduced on 30 June 2020, nearly 200 police raided the newspaper\u2019s headquarters. It was the first time the law was invoked to search a media outlet\u2019s premises, and Lai was arrested along with his two sons and several newspaper executives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Apple Daily closed in June 2021 following another police raid and the freezing of its assets, in what Amnesty at the time called a \u201cbrazen attack on press freedom\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Prior to today\u2019s verdict, Hong Kong courts have convicted Lai in four separate cases involving \u201cunauthorized assemblies\u201d and fraud and handed down prison sentences totalling over seven years. Last year, Amnesty International recognized Lai as a\u00a0prisoner of conscience\u00a0alongside human rights lawyers Chow Hang-tung and Ding Jiaxi.
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL QUOTE 15 December 2025 Responding to today\u2019s conviction of Hong Kong newspaper founder Jimmy Lai on national security charges, Amnesty International\u2019s China Director Sarah Brooks said: \u201cThe predictability of today\u2019s verdict does not make it any less dismaying \u2013 the conviction of Jimmy Lai feels like the death knell for press freedom in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":50000028246,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_yoast_wpseo_opengraph-title":"","_yoast_wpseo_opengraph-description":"","_yoast_wpseo_opengraph-image":"","_yoast_wpseo_opengraph-image-id":0,"_yoast_wpseo_twitter-title":"","_yoast_wpseo_twitter-description":"","_yoast_wpseo_twitter-image":"","_yoast_wpseo_twitter-image-id":0,"_hero_title":"","_hero_content":"","_hero_cta_text":"","_hero_cta_link":"","_hero_alignment":"","_hero_background":"","_hero_size":"","_hero_show":"","_hero_type":"","_hero_embed":"","_hero_video_id":0,"_hero_hide_image_caption":true,"_hero_hide_image_copyright":false,"_nav_style":"","_disable_share_icons":false,"_disable_sidebar":false,"_display_author_info":false,"_hide_featured_image":false,"_hide_featured_image_caption":true,"_maximize_post_content":false,"_reduce_content_width":false,"_sidebar_id":0,"_stretch_thumbnail":false,"byline_context":"","byline_entity":"","byline_is_author":false,"disable_related_content":false,"download_id":0,"download_text":"","show_published_date":true,"show_updated_date":true,"term_slider":"","amnesty_index_number":"","recipients":"","recipients_refresh":"","recipients_refreshed":"","amnesty_umbraco_data":"","document_ref":"","amnesty_updated":"","footnotes":""},"category":[1662,1722],"location":[],"topic":[],"class_list":["post-27541","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-hongkong-news","category-press-release"],"datePosted":"December 15, 2025","mlpRelationships":{"1":27541,"5":28244},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/amnestyhk.org\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27541","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/amnestyhk.org\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/amnestyhk.org\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amnestyhk.org\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/28"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amnestyhk.org\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27541"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/amnestyhk.org\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27541\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amnestyhk.org\/en-us\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/amnestyhk.org\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27541"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amnestyhk.org\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/category?post=27541"},{"taxonomy":"location","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amnestyhk.org\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/location?post=27541"},{"taxonomy":"topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/amnestyhk.org\/en-us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/topic?post=27541"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}