Prime minister Andy Burnham pressed US president Donald Trump to raise the issue of the detention of Hong Kong media tycoon and democracy activist Jimmy Lai when he meets China’s Xi Jinping, according to reports.
Mr Burnham and Mr Trump had scheduled talks lasting more than 30 minutes on Tuesday in New York on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly’s major annual meeting.
Mr Burnham asked Mr Trump to bring up the issue of the release of the British citizen when he meets Mr Xi on Thursday during the Chinese leader’s three-day state visit, sources told Politico.
Mr Trump agreed that Lai should be set free and spend the rest of his days in the UK, according to one of the people who was not named.
Lai, who is the 78-year-old founder of the now-defunct Apply Daily newspaper and a vocal critic of China, was sentenced to 20 years in prison in 2026 after a court found him guilty of violating the Beijing-imposed national security law.
The family of Lai has been calling on the British government to ramp up diplomatic efforts to secure the release of the Hong Kong dissident as they fear he could end up in prison till the end of his life while raising concerns over his deteriorating health.
They have called six years in solitary confinement a “death sentence”.
Mr Trump said he raised the issue directly with Mr Xi in May when he met him in Beijing for a state visit.
However, he later told the media on his way back that freeing Lai was a “tough one for him to do” while the Chinese president would “strongly” consider the release of a pastor of an underground church.
“I did bring him up, it’s a tougher one for him, it’s a tougher one,” Mr Trump said, adding: “He told me, Jimmy Lai is a tough one for him to do.”
The case of Lai, who has been in Hong Kong’s high-security prison since he was arrested in 2020, has grabbed international headlines after human rights advocates rejected the charges and long-running trial as a “sham” and politically motivated to tighten Beijing’s grip on the special administrative region.
On Tuesday, the son of Lai, Sebastian Lai, implored Mr Burnham and foreign secretary Ed Miliband to use the UNGA to build international support for the release of his father, who has spent more than 2,000 days in prison in Hong Kong.
“This is an important opportunity for Britain. President Trump will meet President Xi later this week and I hope the Prime Minister will ask him directly to use that meeting to press for my father’s release.”
He said his return is particularly important because his sister Claire Lai is undergoing treatment for cancer, and that the release “would be an act of humanity and compassion”.
“There are many difficult issues between China and the international community, but freeing one elderly British citizen who has already endured years in prison for trying to protect people’s freedoms would be a powerful gesture of humanity and goodwill,” he said.
