20 years in jail for Lai

JIMMY Lai, the pro-democracy former Hong Kong media tycoon and a fierce critic of the Chinese regime, was yesterday sentenced to 20 years in prison, in one of the most prominent cases prosecuted under a China-imposed national security law that has virtually silenced the city's dissent.

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Judge Esther Toh said 18 years of the 78-year-old British national's sentence should be served consecutively with his jail term in a fraud case, for which he received a jail term of five years and nine months. Lai can appeal his case.

Three government-vetted judges spared Lai the maximum penalty of life imprisonment on charges of conspiring with others to collude with foreign forces to endanger national security and conspiracy to publish seditious articles. He was convicted last December. Given his age, the prison term still could keep him behind bars for the rest of his life.