By Benedict Rogers in The CFHK Foundation
Last year ended darkly for Hong Kong, with the outrageously unjust conviction of pro-democracy media publisher Jimmy Lai on completely false charges just shortly before Christmas.
The new year appears to be beginning with even more dark clouds.
China’s military drills off the coast of Taiwan, which started just before the New Year, send an ominous threat.
With the United States focused on Venezuela and Latin America, Europe understandably prioritizing peace in Ukraine, and the international community striving for peace in the Middle East, whether in Iran or in Gaza, the risk that Beijing may feel further emboldened to attack Taiwan increases by the day.
Jimmy Lai’s sentencing is expected within days — and it’s anticipated to be severe.
Aged 78 and in failing health, any lengthy sentence imposed on Lai could be a death sentence. He may receive the maximum penalty — life imprisonment — but even if the judges only impose the minimum required sentence, that is 10 years in jail and amounts to almost the same.
That Beijing will sentence Lai is not in doubt. And the idea that they will show leniency is unlikely. They want to make an example of Lai, to strike further fear into the hearts of all other Hong Kong dissidents.
Barrister Chow Hang-tung’s national security trial will begin later this month. This brave Hong Kong lawyer, who has been in prison since her arrest in 2021 for her role in organizing peaceful candlelit vigils to commemorate Beijing’s 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre, will finally face her days in court, alongside trade unionist Lee Cheuk-yan. Trials of other political prisoners are also due to begin this year. They should be monitored just as closely as Jimmy Lai’s — and demands for their release intensified. But Lai’s sentence will be the benchmark that will signal Beijing’s intent.
But with the visits of several international leaders to China this year, there’s the opportunity to intensify global pressure on Beijing for the release of political prisoners.
When British Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer visits Beijing as expected later this month, he must surely make the release of Jimmy Lai his top demand. Lai is a British citizen, held in solitary confinement, denied natural sunlight, allowed physical exercise for less than an hour a day, and refused independent medical treatment.
A diabetic, he now suffers heart problems, and according to recent reports from his family, his teeth are rotting and fingernails are falling off.
A devout Catholic, he has been denied the right to receive Holy Communion.
Ideally, Starmer should make his visit to Beijing – and the likely approval of China’s proposed new mega-embassy in London – conditional on Lai’s release on humanitarian and medical grounds. If Lai is released soon after his expected sentence and allowed to leave Hong Kong for the United Kingdom or another place of his choosing to receive medical care and be reunited with his family ahead of Starmer’s Beijing visit, then that would be an achievement that would make the prime minister’s visit to China’s capital worthwhile.
If Starmer achieves that, I will applaud him.
If he cannot secure that – or at the very least secure assurances of Lai’s impending release on such grounds – he shouldn’t go.
And if Beijing refuses to free Lai at all, then the United Kingdom should say no to China’s proposed mega embassy.
Personally, I don’t think the new mega embassy in the old Royal Mint Court next to the Tower of London should be approved at all for symbolic reasons and for national security concerns. But if it can be used to negotiate Lai’s freedom, then it is worth a shot. Either way, it is time to stop kowtowing to Beijing and time to play hardball.
We expect President Trump to visit China later in the year. If Starmer fails to secure Lai’s release, President Trump – who has promised repeatedly to get him out – must make it one of his demands.
Both leaders and others in the international community must also seek the release of all other Hong Kong political prisoners. Jimmy Lai is the symbol – and as such, he is just the start. We must not stop with his case, although we must not cease fighting for his freedom.
The complete dismantling of Hong Kong’s freedoms and the grave injustices that the imprisonment of Lai, Chow, and hundreds of others represent ought to signal a warning about the grave dangers facing Taiwan. And as the international community seeks to free Hong Kong activists, as well as dissidents within mainland China, it must step up its defense of Taiwan. As democracies engage with China, they must do so not simply with dollar signs in their eyes, but with the values of human rights and freedom in their hearts and their own national security in mind.
This should be the year that the free world wakes up to the dangers posed by the regime in Beijing; 2026 ushers in a year of renewed challenges, continued struggles, and fresh opportunities in our efforts for the fight for freedom for Hong Kong and the region more broadly. We must enter the year with renewed determination, a fresh vision, and a new energy for the battles ahead.
My hope is that by the end of 2026, I might meet again in person with my friend Jimmy Lai, his family, and other Hong Kong political prisoners; that we will have deterred threats to Taiwan’s freedom; and that we might have advanced freedom for all of China’s peoples. Let’s work for that goal.
This article was originally published in The CFHK Foundation.