HONG KONG — Jimmy Lai, the 78-year-old media tycoon who dared to challenge Beijing, has been SENTENCED TO DIE IN PRISON. In a SHATTERING blow to Hong Kong’s last vestiges of liberty, a court shackled by China’s national security law handed down a monstrous 20-year term to the founder of Apple Daily, effectively BURYING the city’s free press alongside him. This isn’t just a trial; it’s a STATE-LEVEL EXECUTION of dissent.
Lai’s “crime”? Transforming from a rags-to-riches entrepreneur into Beijing’s MOST FEARED CRITIC. After witnessing the Tiananmen Square massacre, he turned his back on a fortune, famously branding a Chinese premier “the son of a turtle egg” and founding a newspaper whose slogan was a direct provocation: “an apple a day keeps the liars away.” His paper became a roar for democracy, fueling historic protests that brought HALF A MILLION into the streets.
But Beijing never forgets. In a chilling preview of Hong Kong’s future, authorities ARRESTED Lai, RAIDED his newsroom, FROZE its assets, and FORCED Apple Daily to shutter—its final million-copy print run a funeral dirge for truth. The charges of “colluding with foreign forces” stemmed from meetings with U.S. officials, exposing the verdict as a POLITICAL HIT JOB masquerading as justice.
Now, with Lai condemned to rot behind bars until he is nearly 100, a HARROWING message echoes across the globe: In the new Hong Kong, the price for speaking truth to power is the obliteration of your life. The world watches, complicit, as the lights of freedom are systematically snuffed out one prisoner at a time. What city remains when its bravest voices are silenced FOREVER?
Author: Kayitsi.com
