Star Prisoner get Paparazzi Treatment

AP has captured Lai's movements in Stanley Prison

The Associated Press has released an exclusive series of pictures documenting Apple Daily founder Jimmy Lai Chee-ying at Stanley Prison.

The 75-year-old is in solitary confinement for 23 hours a day, and is allowed 50 minutes of exercise per day -- by himself. This punishment is for a Category A prisoner, a status usually reserved for those who have committed serious crimes like murder.

In the pictures Lai wears prison-mandated short-sleeved shirt, shorts and his own sandals. He looks like he has lost some weight. The government is making it harder for the media to take pictures of inmates, even during court appearances, where the prisoners must go through a covered walkway to and from the prison vehicle.

Lai is in solitary confinement for 23 hours a day

Lai is a British national, who is accused of colluding with foreign forces to endanger national security, and conspiring to call for sanctions or blockades against Hong Kong or China. He also faces a charge of conspiracy to print seditious publications under a colonial-era law.

He was scheduled to go to trial last December, but it was postponed to next month, while the Hong Kong government appealed to Beijing to block his attempt to hire a British defense lawyer.

Each month, Lai is allowed two 30-minute visits by relatives or friends where they are separated by a piece of glass and they speak on a phone.

Meanwhile his son Sebastien is traveling to democratic countries, advocating for his father's release. Even though he is not in Hong Kong, Sebastien is very cautious about his movements.

"My father is in prison because he spoke truth to power for decades," Sebastien said in May in a statement to a US government panel, called the Congressional-Executive Commission on China.

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"He is still speaking truth to power and refusing to be silenced, even though he has lost everything and he may die in prison," he said. "I am very proud to be his son."

How his father, a diabetic who is also suffering from high blood pressure continues to keep his head up high is a result of his strong will and Christian faith.

Today Lai and six others were cleared of instigating the 2019 protests, though their convictions and sentences are upheld. 

The others are barristers Margaret Ng Ngoi-yee, Martin Lee Chu-ming, labour activists, Lee Cheuk-yan, Leung Kwok-hung, and former lawmakers Cyd Ho Sau-lan and Albert Ho Chun-yan.