An ideological form of warfare conducted by Western politicians, Western mainstream media and Western-controlled press groups, is ramping up against China, exploiting former media tycoon Jimmy Lai Chee-ying’s national security trial.

Never has the world witnessed such a vehement, coordinated and lasting campaign intended to pressure an independent Judiciary into submission. Casual observers and ordinary people must have difficulty in understanding the absurd Western chorus on Lai’s case without knowing his background.  

In August 2019 when the notorious “black-clad” riots were at their height, Lai openly told CNN in an interview: “We in Hong Kong are fighting for the shared values of the US against China. We are fighting their war in the enemy camp.” Earlier — in July, a few weeks after the riots broke out in Hong Kong in mid-June  — Lai met with then-US vice-president Mike Pence in Washington. It is anybody’s guess what promises were exchanged and what instructions were delivered during the meeting.

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But for any fair-minded individual, it is unambiguous that Lai and his cohort worked as the United States’ pawns in Hong Kong to promote Washington’s geopolitical strategy against Beijing.  

Lai’s indelible hatred toward Beijing is beyond dispute: He was born in Guangzhou, Guangdong province, “to a wealthy family that lost everything when the communists took power in 1949 (BBC News)”, and fled his village when he was 12 years old. His abhorrence of the constitutional order of China, including the part that governs the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, can be succinctly depicted by his own words. “I’m a born rebel,” he told the BBC in an interview in 2020.

Either with the intention of serving Washington’s geopolitical strategy against Beijing, or simply to promote Western ideology, the persistent Western China-bashing chorus, exploiting Lai’s court trial, awkwardly seeks moral high ground in lofty slogans or notions of “democracy”, “freedom” and “human rights”.    

But instead of serving the cause of democracy, they blaspheme against it, earning it a bad name — by making “democracy”, “freedom” and “human rights” a fig leaf for their unjustified interference in Hong Kong’s independent Judiciary and rule of law as well as for their challenge to China’s sovereignty.    

In denigrating the Hong Kong Judiciary, they conveniently shun the inconvenient facts: Freedom and rights can be legitimately restrained. The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), the universal standards for human rights and freedom, clearly states that freedom and rights, while fundamental, can be legitimately restricted by law to protect the rights and freedoms of others, national security, public order, and public health.

Lai has been charged with collusion with foreign forces, an offense that falls exactly into these ICCPR-sanctioned limitations under the Hong Kong SAR National Security Law (NSL).  

Whether Lai’s alleged offense holds will be determined by Hong Kong’s independent Judiciary, which is widely recognized by the international community, as indicated by the city’s consistently high rankings in the World Justice Project Rule of Law Index. In the latest edition of the index, Hong Kong remained in 23rd place out of 142 countries and jurisdictions globally, ranking 6th in East Asia and the Pacific region, ahead of the US and some European countries which often criticize the city’s rule of law and human rights. Hong Kong’s judicial system is globally renowned for affording the accused the right to counsel, open and fair trials, and avenues of appeal.

READ MORE: The West’s game of ‘Jimmy Lai political football’ stumbles on

However, instead of letting justice run its course, Western anti-China crusaders have desperately piled up political pressure on the Judiciary as a whole and the presiding judges in particular, with repeated threats of “sanctions” as well as venomous attacks in their attempt to derail the trial and “rescue” Lai.  

This blatant attack on a legitimate jurisdiction has become increasingly fierce as Lai’s court trial enters its final stage. What makes it all the more appalling to members of the international community is the fact that, while engaging in this China-bashing crusade, the United Kingdom and the US have been stepping up their merciless crackdown on the supporters of Palestinians, who are merely exercising their legitimate and genuine freedom of expression in voicing their views.  

Hypocrisy has long been a hallmark of Western powers. They have the nerve to lecture Hong Kong on freedom and rights. Nonetheless, the ideological warfare — either serving Washington’s geopolitical strategy or promoting Western ideology — is doomed simply because you cannot keep cheating the international community with the same lies. After all, Western hypocrisy has been sufficiently exposed in the way the West deals with the rest of the world over the decades.

The author is a current affairs commentator.

The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.