The son of detained Hong Kong media mogul Jimmy Lai has urged foreign judges to carefully consider whether they should continue to serve in judicial roles “in this place that imprisons pro-democracy protesters”.
Speaking during a visit to Australia, Sebastien Lai said Hong Kong “has more than 1,800 political prisoners and these political prisoners are there for their pro-democracy protesting”.
He did not directly blame foreign judges for that development, but noted that two UK judges and a Canadian judge had recently decided to cease their roles in Hong Kong.
Sebastien Lai said the judges who chose to leave Hong Kong were “voting with their feet”.
“By staying, you’re essentially saying that, well, there’s still some semblance of the rule of law in this place that imprisons pro-democracy protesters,” he told the National Press Club in Canberra on Monday.
“And that is not true, that is not true at all.”
Sebastien Lai is in Australia to advocate on behalf of his father Jimmy Lai, 76, who has pleaded not guilty to charges of conspiring to collude with foreign forces and conspiring to publish seditious material.
In December, Australia joined with 23 other countries to issue a statement denouncing “continued attacks on freedom of the press and their suppression of independent local media in Hong Kong”.
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