Hong Kong’s security chief has lashed out at British newspaper The Guardian over an article citing experts criticising a top court ruling on media mogul Jimmy Lai’s appeal as “another cut on the city’s once revered legal system.”
In a letter published on the Security Bureau’s website on Sunday, Secretary for Security Chris Tang said the article contained “smearing remarks” against the city’s handling of national security cases and that he wished to “set the record straight.”
Last week, the Court of Final Appeal (CFA) denied Lai’s application to appeal against a lower court ruling that effectively barred him from hiring British lawyer Tim Owen for his national security trial.
Lai, who founded the now-defunct pro-democracy newspaper Apple Daily, stands accused of taking part in a “conspiracy to collude with foreign forces” under the national security legislation and conspiring to publish “seditious” materials.
The Guardian called the top court’s ruling an “obscure legal development” and quoted several legal experts, including Jonathan Sumption, a British judge who previously said Hong Kong was “slowly becoming a totalitarian state”, days after he quit the CFA last year.
In The Guardian‘s article, Sumption was quoted as saying that the ruling “tells us quite a lot about the view of the rule of law taken by the executive.”
Tang wrote in his letter that there was “nothing obscure” about the top court’s verdict.
Lai’s “application for leave to appeal was dismissed through a summary procedure because it was wholly devoid of merits,” he wrote.
“We reject the use of such biased and misleading language to cast aspersions against the court’s professionalism and impartiality,” the security chief added.
‘More favourable than the UK’
The CFA’s judgement last week was the latest development in the long court saga sparked by Lai’s plan to hire the British lawyer in 2022.
A specialist in human rights law, Owen is not qualified to practice in the city, requiring permission in order to represent clients in the courts.
At first, Owen was permitted by the High Court to represent Lai in October 2022. That decision was upheld by the Court of Appeal and the Court of Final Appeal.
In November 2022, hours after the top court’s ruling, Chief Executive John Lee requested Beijing to issue an interpretation of the national security law, which empowered the national security committee – chaired by Lee himself – to decide whether a foreign lawyer could be allowed to take part in national security proceedings on a case by case basis.
In full: Explainer: Beijing’s first interpretation of Hong Kong’s national security law
The British lawyer was barred after Lee said allowing him to be involved in Lai’s national security case was “contrary to the interests of national security.”
According to The Guardian article, the “issue at the heart of Lai’s appeal was not the visa” but the fact that the national security committee’s decisions cannot be legally challenged.
The report also quoted former University of Hong Kong law professor Michael C Davis, who said the top court had “surely missed an opportunity to [rein] in what has become excessive resort to national security claims and to better articulate the boundaries, if any, of the committee’s immunity from review.”
Tang wrote that the introduction of a system for “ad hoc admission in national security cases” was “more favourable than most other jurisdictions, including the UK.”
There are more than 100 senior counsels, 1,600 barristers, and 13,000 solicitors “admitted in Hong Kong and available” and the public had a right to choose their own representation, he added.
Lai’s trial had entered its 145th day when it was adjourned earlier this month to allow the prosecution and defence to prepare their closing arguments, set to be heard in July. The trial – originally expected to take 80 days – began in December 2023.
The media mogul faces up to life imprisonment if he is found guilty.
Beijing inserted national security legislation directly into Hong Kong’s mini-constitution in June 2020 following a year of pro-democracy protests and unrest. It criminalised subversion, secession, collusion with foreign forces and terrorist acts – broadly defined to include disruption to transport and other infrastructure. The move gave police sweeping new powers and led to hundreds of arrests amid new legal precedents, while dozens of civil society groups disappeared. The authorities say it restored stability and peace to the city, rejecting criticism from trade partners, the UN and NGOs.
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