{"id":75623,"date":"2025-12-15T13:31:20","date_gmt":"2025-12-15T04:31:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2025\/dec\/15\/jimmy-lai-rise-fall-hong-kong-itself"},"modified":"2025-12-15T13:31:20","modified_gmt":"2025-12-15T04:31:20","slug":"the-rise-and-fall-of-jimmy-lai-whose-trajectory-mirrored-that-of-hong-kong-itself","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/?p=75623","title":{"rendered":"The rise and fall of Jimmy Lai, whose trajectory mirrored that of Hong Kong itself"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Progressing from child labourer to billionaire, Lai used his power and wealth to promote democracy, which ultimately pitted him against authorities in Beijing<\/p>\n<p>On Monday, a Hong Kong court <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2025\/dec\/15\/jimmy-lai-verdict-hong-kong-judges-national-security-charges\">convicted Jimmy Lai of national security offences<\/a>, the end to a landmark trial for the city and its hobbled protest movement.<\/p>\n<p>The verdict was expected. Long a thorn in the side of Beijing, Lai, a 78-year-old media tycoon and activist, was a primary target of the most recent and definitive crackdown on Hong Kong\u2019s pro-democracy movement. Authorities cast him as a traitor and a criminal.<\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/world\/2025\/dec\/15\/jimmy-lai-rise-fall-hong-kong-itself\">Continue reading&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Progressing from child labourer to billionaire, Lai used his power and wealth to promote democracy, which ultimately pitted him against authorities in BeijingOn Monday, a Hong Kong court convicted Jimmy Lai of national security offences, the end to a l&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5114,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sns_share_botton_hide":"","vkExUnit_sns_title":"","_vk_print_noindex":"","sitemap_hide":"","_veu_custom_css":"","veu_display_promotion_alert":"","vkexunit_cta_each_option":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[41,50,48,3034,54],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-75623","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-asia-pacific","category-china","category-hong-kong","category-jimmy-lai","category-press-freedom"],"veu_head_title_object":{"title":"","add_site_title":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75623","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5114"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=75623"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75623\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":75624,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75623\/revisions\/75624"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=75623"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=75623"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/eastasianews.net\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=75623"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}