HONG KONG—A Hong Kong court on Monday rejected a jailed publisher’s request to terminate his national security trial, pressing ahead with a landmark case seen as part of Beijing’s crackdown on the city’s pro-democracy movement.
Jimmy Lai, the 75-year-old founder of the now-defunct newspaper Apple Daily, faces up to life in prison if convicted under a Beijing-imposed national security law. His lawyers earlier filed an application to halt the trial, raising concerns that his case was being heard by three judges approved by the city’s leader, instead of a jury.
When Hong Kong returned to China in 1997, it was promised that trials by jury, previously practiced in the former British colony, would be maintained under the city’s constitution. But in a departure from the city’s common law tradition, the security law allows no-jury trials for national security cases….