Missing bookseller makes tearful TV ‘confession’ over decade-old crime

One of five missing Hong Kong booksellers has reappeared in a detention centre on Chinese state TV. In a tearful video confession, Gui Minhai said he handed himself in to take responsibility for a fatal drink-driving incident in 2004. Mr Gui, who was given a two-year suspended sentence at the time, said he fled his probation in 2006, and was “returning to surrender by personal choice”. However, his daughter Angela, who lives in Britain, was not convinced by the video, in which her father wears different tops and has different hair styles. She said she believed her father was abducted because of his work on books critical of the Chinese leadership.

I am taking my legal responsibilities, and am willing to accept any punishment

Gui Minhai

Mr Gui, who is a Swedish citizen and was last been seen at his holiday home in Pattaya, Thailand, in October was known for his provocative books about the Chinese leadership. Four other men linked to the publishing company and bookshop have also gone missing in recent months. In the video, he pleads for Sweden not to get involved in his cae, saying: “I truly feel I’m Chinese, my roots are still in China.” However, Sophie Richardson, China director at Human Rights Watch, said: “Three months of arbitrary detention, no access to family and lawyers, and now a nationally broadcast interrogation. The developments in Gui’s case bear all the hallmarks of China’s politicised judicial system.”

Beijing couldn’t be doing a better job of destroying its credibility with these cases.

Sophie Richardson, Human Rights Watch

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