The plight of Jimmy Lai shames us all
Dictatorships use solitary confinement as a form of torture, designed to break the prisoner's spirit. Under international law, 'prolonged solitary confinement' is defined as exceeding 15 days.
British citizen and 77 year-old media entrepreneur Jimmy Lai, in jail in Hong Kong, has now exceeded 1,600 days in solitary confinement, yet has committed no crime.
He has already served several prison sentences on multiple trumped-up charges, including 13 months for lighting a candle and saying a prayer at a vigil commemorating the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre.
He is currently on trial under Hong Kong's draconian National Security Law, imposed by Beijing in 2020, and could face life imprisonment, simply for standing up for the human rights and democratic principles that China pledged to guarantee when it was handed control of Hong Kong from British rule.
The authorities appear determined to drag his trial out for as long as possible. When it started at the end of 2023, it was due to last 30 days. Multiple adjournments have meant that closing submissions will not be heard until August this year and the verdict and sentencing may not come until the end of the year, making it a two-year trial process. This outrageous foot-dragging is designed to test the mental strength of Mr Lai, his family and his legal team.
Despite widespread international condemnation, Mr Lai continues to be held in a tiny cell for more than 23 hours a day, deprived of natural light, and permitted less than an hour a day for physical exercise in a confined space.
This is dehumanising and brutal treatment more often associated with 'maximum security prisons' for extremely violent offenders, while Mr Lai just lit a candle to commemorate a massacre that China has tried to erase from history, and exercised his freedom of expression by founding and publishing a successful newspaper. He is in jail for journalism, and for his opinions.
Mr Lai, who is diabetic, has been denied access to independent medical care, and denied the right to his first choice of legal counsel, when British barrister Tim Owen KC was barred from representing him. His international legal team has received numerous outrageous threats. Even the right to receive Holy Communion has been restricted which, for Mr Lai as a devout Catholic, is a particularly poignant cruelty.
Several governments around the world – including the United Kingdom, United States and Australia – have called for his release, as have the Canadian and European Parliaments. Five United Nations Special Rapporteurs – independent experts on freedom of expression, freedom of association, torture, the independence of judges and lawyers, and counter-terrorism and human rights – and the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention have expressed concerns about the case.
But the key question is what is the British government actually doing to free its citizen? It is not that no one seems to care – plenty of sympathy and support has been expressed for Mr Lai's plight. The fact that both the Prime Minister and the Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves have raised the case in their exchanges with China's leaders is welcome. A cross-departmental approach from the Government is the right strategy.
But the important question is how was it raised? In passing, as a box-ticking exercise, or in a meaningful way? If Mr Lai dies in jail, what will be the consequences for China's relations with the United Kingdom, and have they been spelled out?
It is time to turn sympathy into action, and words into meaningful measures. That is why an open letter to the prime minister last week by 22 former prisoners or relatives of former prisoners from around the world, asking him 'to do everything in your power to bring Jimmy Lai home', is so powerful and significant.
Among the signatories are people whose own plight once looked dire. They include Russian opposition politician Vladimir Kara-Murza and his wife Evgenia, former Iranian prisoner Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe and her husband Richard, Chinese-Australian journalist Cheng Lei who was jailed in China, Paul Rusebagina who was imprisoned in Rwanda and the former Soviet dissident
For these reasons, they urge the United Kingdom to take urgent steps to secure Mr Lai's release, 'before it is too late'. They call on the prime minister to meet Mr Lai's family as a matter of urgency, and to take 'robust, principled, strategic action'.
President Donald Trump has said that Mr Lai's case will be on the table in any US-China trade talks. The United Kingdom must be equally strategic in identifying what leverage it can use to free Mr Lai. It must make it clear to Beijing that Mr Lai's continued imprisonment – and the risk that he might die in jail – is not in the interests of either China or Hong Kong. Not if it wishes to remain a significant business partner.
Other countries have been able to secure the release of their citizens from China. Australia worked hard to free Cheng Lai, as did Canada in the case of its citizens Michael Spavor and Michael Kovrig, and Ireland with the detention of businessman Richard O'Halloran. The United States spares no effort in securing the release of its citizens unjustly imprisoned abroad. Sir Keir Starmer therefore must step up to free Mr Lai.
Mr Lai's name must be on the lips of every world leader, every diplomat, every journalist and every Parliamentarian until he is freed. He should never have been arrested in the first place, but after four and a half years of his detention in solitary confinement it is time to say clearly to Beijing: enough is enough. Free Jimmy Lai now.
Benedict Rogers is Senior Director of Fortify Rights and a co-founder and trustee of Hong Kong Watch
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