Jailed media tycoon Jimmy Lai has told his national security trial that he paid a retired US army general to give advice to former Taiwanese president Tsai Ing-wen regarding the attitude of Donald Trump’s first administration to the self-ruled island.
Jimmy Lai in 2020. File photo: HKFP.
The court heard on Thursday that Lai, 77, engaged Jack Keane, a former vice chief of staff of the US army, and Paul Wolfowitz, an ex-US deputy secretary of defence, to act as consultants for Tsai in January 2017, days before Trump was sworn in as US president for the first time.
In a WhatsApp message Lai sent to his personal aide Mark Simon on January 5 that year, the tycoon said he had a “wonderful dinner meeting” with Keane and Wolfowitz and that the pair would go to Taipei for an “independent and non-political” consultancy project.
“This must be handled with strict confidentiality because once the media picks it up [they] will destroy it,” the court heard Lai wrote in the text message.
“The purpose [of the consultancy] was to relay… what Tsai Ing-wen wanted to know about the Trump administration’s attitude and sentiment to Taiwan,” Lai told the court.
He said the idea came about after Antonio Chiang, who Lai described as the right-hand man to Tsai, asked him to suggest names in the US who could brief the then-Taiwanese president about Washington’s attitude towards the island.
Chiang is the vice-president of the General Association of Chinese Culture, a Taiwanese NGO traditionally chaired by the island’s president, according to the organisation’s website.
Prosecutor Anthony Chau told the court that the pair’s consultancy to Tsai lasted between 2017 and 2019, while Lai said that they went to Taipei about “three or four times.”
Former Taiwan president Tsai Ing-wen (second from right). File photo: Wikicommons.
The Apple Daily founder also said he had arranged the logistics for the pair’s trips in Taiwan and paid Keane “for his service,” including his lawyers’ fee for obtaining approval from US authorities to proceed with the consultancy.
Judge Alex Lee asked why Lai had to make the payment and not the Taiwan government considering the pair’s mission was to brief its president.
“But it was my arrangement, [Keane] was my friend and I asked him to help. Tsai didn’t know that I was paying him,” Lai replied.
The prosecution began cross-examination of Lai on Thursday as the tycoon was giving evidence for the 27th day in his high-profile national security trial.
Lai has pleaded not guilty to two charges of conspiracy to collude with foreign forces under a Beijing-imposed security law and a third charge of conspiracy to publish “seditious” materials under colonial-era legislation. He could be jailed for life if convicted.
Keane, Wolfowitz and Simon are among what the prosecution alleges are the many “agents” or “intermediaries” of the tycoon to request international sanctions against Hong Kong and Beijing.
‘Time is not’ with Taiwan
Prosecutor Chau on Thursday drew the court’s attention to multiple WhatsApp messages Lai exchanged with Simon and Chiang in 2017, in which the tycoon discussed the idea of Taiwan having a closer military relationship with the US to counter Beijing’s “belligerence.”
In a text message dated January 6 that year, Lai sent a “strictly confidential” note to Chiang and asked the latter to “destroy” it after reading it.
“Without America’s military presence on its land, Taiwan lives in [turmoil] next to a dictatorial China prone to constant sabre-rattling,” Lai wrote.
“Time is not on the side of Taiwan’s democracy. Taiwan must take this window of opportunity to secure [a] certain presence of American military on its land,” he added.
Donald Trump. File photo: The White House, via Flickr CC2.0.
In court, Lai said he was merely relaying an idea floated by US commentators at that time that Washington should deploy some of the country’s troops stationed in Japan to the self-ruled island.
The three judges overseeing the trial raised questions as to why Lai insisted on confidentiality if the idea had already been discussed in the media, adding that the tycoon himself talked about it publicly in his talk show “Live Chat with Jimmy Lai” in 2020.
“Your ‘Live Chat’ only took place after the [Beijing-imposed security law], it’s in July 2020. At that point in time, would it not be even more sensitive for you to talk about US troops stationing in Taiwan?” Judge Lee asked.
Lai said the situation had been “very different” in 2017 and that he did not want to be seen as discussing the issue because he was “a Chinese in Hong Kong.”
He said he agreed with the idea of having a US military presence in Taiwan but denied Judge Susana D’Almada Remedio’s suggestion that he was “the middle man” between Washington and Taipei.
In another text message dated November 9, 2017, Simon told Lai that Keane and “his view on China being expansionist had the ear” of the president.
“Good to hear about Jack[‘s] aggressive position. I hope Tsai notices that,” Lai replied.
In court, Lai rejected the prosecutor’s suggestion that Keane was “very close” to Trump and said that he was only aware that the two had meetings “sometimes.”
The court also heard Lai texted Chiang on August 19, 2017, about Keane and Wolfowitz’s proposal to have Taiwan purchase US energy for a decade and hire retired US army generals to “modernise” the island’s military.
