Trump says he will do everything he can to save jailed Hong Kong publisher Jimmy Lai

Globe and Mail

a day ago

U.S. President Donald Trump says his government will 'do everything we can' to help jailed Hong Kong publisher Jimmy Lai ahead of closing arguments in Mr. Lai's trial under Beijing's national security law.
In a Fox radio interview on Thursday, Mr. Trump said he had already raised Mr. Lai's case with the Chinese government.
'I've already brought it up and I am going to do everything I can to save him. I'm going to do everything,' the President said. 'His name has already entered the circle of things that we're talking about and we'll see what we can do.'
Mr. Trump's reaffirmed pledge to press for Mr. Lai's release follows similar advocacy from the European Union, Britain and Australia. And it turns up pressure on Prime Minister Mark Carney, who has so far not spoken out on the case despite Mr. Lai's close ties to Canada.
Mr. Trump did not specify how exactly he had raised Mr. Lai's name or how he planned to do so in the future. The U.S. and China are locked in trade negotiations precipitated by Mr. Trump's escalation of tariffs on Beijing earlier this year. Mr. Trump has said he will meet Chinese President Xi Jinping this year if a trade agreement is reached.
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Before last year's election, Mr. Trump said he 'a hundred per cent' would speak with Mr. Xi about Mr. Lai. In May, he said Mr. Lai would be 'part of the negotiation' in trade talks with China.
In his comments Thursday, Mr. Trump was careful to manage expectations. 'I didn't say a hundred per cent, I'd save him. I said a hundred per cent, I'm going to be bringing it up,' he said. The President said Mr. Xi 'would not be exactly thrilled' to let Mr. Lai go.
Mr. Lai owned the pro-democracy Apple Daily newspaper, among other business interests. He was arrested in 2020 under the national security law, which the Chinese government imposed on the city amid protests that said the law was nothing more than a cover to crack down on free speech and dissent.
The 77-year-old publisher has spent four years and eight months in solitary confinement at a maximum-security prison. He has diabetes and his lawyers have raised concerns that sweltering-hot conditions behind bars are grievously damaging his health. His trial is set to hear closing arguments on Friday.
Mr. Lai's mother was Canadian, his sister lives in Canada and he owns restaurants, hotels and spas in the country. Among the charges he faces is 'collusion with foreign countries,' including speaking with Canadian parliamentarians. Prosecutors accuse him of orchestrating anti-government protests in 2019 and trying to get other countries to place sanctions on Chinese officials.
Former justice minister Irwin Cotler, Mr. Lai's Canadian lawyer, said Mr. Trump's support for Mr. Lai shows an international political convergence on the issue that could influence China by tying the case to Beijing's trade and diplomatic interests.
'My hope is that China would realize at this point that the release of Jimmy Lai is not only the right thing to do from the point of view of justice, from the point of view of humanity,' he said in an interview, 'but that it is in their self-interest to release him.'
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He said Mr. Lai was being held in 'torturous' conditions that, with his medical deterioration, amounted to 'a slow-moving execution.'
Mr. Cotler said the case marked 'an unusual moment' in which both Republicans and top Democrats, including former House speaker Nancy Pelosi, are on the same side of an issue. 'At this point, I'd like to see our own government in Canada step up and exercise leadership,' he said.
In June, Liberal MP Judy Sgro was set to present a motion to the House of Commons calling for Mr. Lai to be granted honorary Canadian citizenship. Ms. Sgro said the move, which had garnered multiparty support, was shut down by Government House Leader Steven MacKinnon.
Mr. MacKinnon's office later told The Globe and Mail that it objected to putting forth such a motion 'without any debate,' even though Mr. Lai's case has previously been discussed by Parliament.
Mr. Carney also did not respond to calls from Amnesty International and other human-rights groups to put Mr. Lai's case on the agenda of the G7 summit he hosted in Kananaskis, Alta., that month.
The Prime Minister's Office did not respond to a request for comment on Thursday.
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer raised Mr. Lai directly with Mr. Xi in a meeting last year, EU diplomats pressed his case with their Chinese counterparts in June and Australia's government has said his arrest was part of a campaign to 'repress civil society and prosecute journalists.'
With a report from Marie Woolf