Hong Kong democracy activist Howard Lam’s kidnap claims unravel further following arrest
Opposition politicians who rallied behind Democratic Party member Howard Lam Tsz-kin also faced questions about their credibility for projecting his case as evidence of the city’s freedoms being undermined by Beijing
More damning discrepancies have appeared in a Hong Kong democracy activist’s story about being kidnapped from a busy city street and tortured by mainland Chinese agents, after he was arrested early on Tuesday on suspicion of misleading police.
Opposition politicians who rallied behind Democratic Party member Howard Lam Tsz-kin also faced questions about their credibility for projecting his case as evidence of the city’s freedoms being undermined by Beijing.
Lam claimed he was pushed into a van in Yau Ma Tei last Thursday by Putonghua-speaking men who took him to an unknown location, punched staples into his legs, and dumped him on a beach in Sai Kung, from where he made his own way home in a taxi.
But police investigations, according to a force insider, suggested something less dramatic – he took a minibus from Mong Kok to Sai Kung.
The revelation cast further doubt on the activist’s story after the FactWire news agency earlier cited closed-circuit television footage collected from nearby shops and buildings contradicting his version of events.