Hong Kong pro-democracy media tycoon Jimmy Lai has filed a legal bid against the government decision to reject any further work visa applications from an overseas counsel he had hired for his national security case.
Lai, 75, who founded the defunct pro-democracy tabloid Apple Daily, faces a total of four charges under the Beijing-imposed national security law and the colonial-era sedition law.
His case sparked debate over the participation of overseas counsel not qualified to practice in Hong Kong in the city’s national security cases, after Lai sought to hire King’s Counsel Timothy Owen to represent him in court.
The High Court admitted Owen in a decision in October last year despite government objection. The Court of Appeal and Court of Final Appeal later rejected three further attempts from the government to bar the king’s counsel from the case.
Following the defeat at the city’s top court, Chief Executive John Lee invited Beijing to intervene on the matter in November last year.
The trial against Lai was also adjourned as the city awaited Beijing’s decision. At the same time, Lai’s representative Senior Counsel Robert Pang revealed that the Immigration Department had withheld Owen’s visa extension application.
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In an application for leave to apply for judicial review filed on Tuesday, Lai’s team sought to quash a decision and judgement from the national security committee which ruled that the king’s counsel’s participation in Lai’s case was contrary to national security interests.
Lai also sought to challenge a decision made by the director of immigration that any new visa application from Owen “should be refused.”
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