Hong Kong media tycoon Jimmy Lai is facing life imprisonment under the Beijing-imposed National Security Law.Vincent Yu/The Associated Press
Irwin Cotler is a Canadian former minister of justice and attorney-general, and Canadian counsel to Jimmy Lai. Brandon Silver is an international human rights lawyer and director of policy and projects at the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights.
As the sham trial of pro-democracy publisher Jimmy Lai resumes in Hong Kong, it’s not just his life and the future of Hong Kong that hang in the balance – Canada’s sovereignty and the security of Canadians are also on trial. It is a test of our country’s fortitude in withstanding the growing assault on our freedom and fundamental rights.
Mr. Lai, who has been languishing in torturous prison conditions since 2020, faces life imprisonment under the Beijing-imposed National Security Law (NSL). His alleged crime: Supporting journalism, democracy and the rule of law. These are foundational Canadian values.
Mr. Lai’s case epitomizes the dangerous decline of Hong Kong and the Kafkaesque erosion of its legal system by the NSL. Overriding local laws and enforceable by Chinese authorities, the NSL criminalizes freedom through vague and overbroad crimes that are weaponized to crush dissent and destroy fundamental rights. It is a standing breach of international human rights law, of Chinese and Hong Kong law, and of the legally binding Sino-British Joint Declaration.
What’s more, this same draconian NSL was recently used by Hong Kong authorities to issue bounties against Canadians, which were later amplified in Canada through Chinese foreign interference campaigns.
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Mr. Lai, who has strong Canadian connections, is the most prominent victim of the NSL. Despite numerous all-party parliamentary interventions, including committee studies and hearings imploring action, unanimous consent motions in both the House and the Senate calling for his release, and a national news conference with more than a dozen leading parliamentarians, the government is effectively giving the NSL licence to be further weaponized against other Canadians – on our own soil, and in breach of our sovereignty.
Ottawa’s absence is particularly noticeable given that there has been a rare demonstration of international diplomatic convergence in recent months. Last July, Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong called out Mr. Lai’s prosecution as emblematic of “Hong Kong’s widespread application of national security laws to repress civil society and prosecute journalists”; in November, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer publicly raised the case with Chinese President Xi Jinping; and most notably, earlier this week, U.S. President Donald Trump publicly pledged that “I am going to do everything I can to save” Mr. Lai. The European Union also continues to prominently and persistently call for his release.
What Canada does next will have important consequences on the well-being of Mr. Lai and all Canadians. His persecution, and the transnational repression that followed, were the first test we’ve failed. Any further inaction poses an acute risk to the 300,000 Canadian citizens in Hong Kong, and the more than 500,000 Canadians of Hong Kong origin across Canada.
Now that Canada has begun a high-level dialogue with China to regularize relations, Jimmy Lai’s case should be a part of the conversation. Prime Minister Mark Carney raising the case could help save his life, and send a clear signal about the worsening weaponization of the NSL. At the very least, Mr. Lai should be a standing part of the dedicated consular discussions taking place with China.
For Mr. Lai, Canada’s support would be an urgent humanitarian gesture for a 77-year-old diabetic with immediate family, extensive businesses, and unanimous political support in Canada.
For Canadians, it would be an act of both moral leadership and national defence. Supporting Jimmy Lai is the best way to stand up for Canadian values and the international order that Canada helped build but is quickly unravelling on our watch. It would be a refusal to let inaction be read as permission, asserting our independence and international norms in the face of increasing NSL assaults on our sovereignty and citizens.
For China, Canada’s request for Mr. Lai’s humanitarian release will provide an opportunity to show compassion for an ailing septuagenarian, and course correct in a case that is undermining Hong Kong’s economy – through tourism, trade and foreign investment – not to mention its freedom and democracy.
How Canada responds to Mr. Lai’s plight will echo far beyond Hong Kong. It will signal to our allies, our adversaries, and our citizens whether our government has the resolve to defend freedom and the rule of law. Just as Mr. Lai stands trial in Hong Kong, so too does Canada – and the verdict will depend on whether we choose inaction, or the defence of democracy and our own sovereignty.