Jimmy Lai rejects claim he used Hong Kong activist to lobby West for sanctions

Former media boss says he suggested paralegal Wayland Chan meet a House of Lords member and a Hong Kong ‘freedom fighter’ in UK

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Jimmy Lai being escorted into a Hong Kong Correctional Services van in 2021. Photo: AFP

Published: 8:00pm, 4 Feb 2025Updated: 11:25pm, 4 Feb 2025

Former Hong Kong media boss Jimmy Lai Chee-ying has denied using an activist to urge Western governments to impose sanctions on the city and mainland China as part of an international lobbying campaign.

Prosecutors on Tuesday said Lai’s regular contact with paralegal Wayland Chan Tsz-wah in 2019 and 2020 involved more than just discussions on how to end the violence of the anti-government protests as the Apple Daily tabloid founder had previously claimed.

The defendant maintained he had only known Chan as a potentially influential figure among the “valiant” frontline faction of the protest movement, but not as one of those behind the “Fight for Freedom, Stand with Hong Kong” (SWHK) lobbying group.

But the founder of the now-defunct tabloid acknowledged he had introduced two British political figures to the activist in late 2019, a move which had nothing to do with the de-escalation of violence in the protests.

Lai, 77, is standing trial at West Kowloon Court on two conspiracy charges of collusion with foreign forces under the national security law, and a third count of conspiracy to print and distribute seditious publications in breach of colonial-era legislation.

The outspoken Beijing critic is accused of orchestrating a lobbying campaign by using Chan to relay his instructions to SWHK’s core members in the hope of mobilising Western governments to take hostile actions against Hong Kong and the mainland.