Lam Wing-kee, Hong Kong bookseller, honoured in Taiwan

Lam Wing-kee, the Hong Kong bookseller who fled to Taiwan after being detained by China, was honoured at a memorial service in Taipei after his death from cancer.

Lam, 70, died in Taipei on July 2. Taiwanese Premier Cho Jung-tai told mourners at a Presbyterian church on Friday that Lam’s life was “a story of struggle, resistance and defiance against the Chinese Communist Party”. Cho presented a posthumous certificate, which was accepted by Lam’s son.

Several senior Taiwanese officials attended the ceremony, followed by a separate memorial service attended by more than 100 people, organisers said.

Lam was one of five publishers who sold books about Chinese leaders and disappeared at the end of 2015 before resurfacing in mainland custody and making televised confessions. He later said he had been blindfolded by mainland police after crossing the border at Shenzhen and interrogated for months.

Lam fled to Taiwan in April 2019 after Hong Kong announced plans to allow extraditions to China. He reopened Causeway Bay Books in Taipei in 2020 and frequently urged people to protect Taiwan’s democratic system. He had recently closed the shop, citing health reasons, after saying last year that his lung adenocarcinoma had returned and progressed to stage four.