British media tycoon and pro-democracy campaigner Jimmy Lai has been jailed by a Hong Kong court for 20 years.

Mr Lai, 78, was convicted of foreign collusion and sedition, and his punishment has been condemned as ‘effectively a death sentence’ by rights groups.

He founded the now-defunct Apple Daily newspaper, and was convicted under a sweeping national security law imposed by Beijing.

Mr Lai, who holds a British passport, has received the harshest sentence yet under the controversial new law by some way.

He incurred the wrath of the state with his pro-democracy newspaper, which he often used as a tool of protest, but he always denied the charges against him.

Six former executives of the paper were also jailed today – with sentences between six years and nine months and 10 years.

Lai’s barrister had said he suffers from hypertension and diabetes, among other ailments, but the court said it was ‘not inclined’ to soften the sentence on account of his medical condition.

The leader of Lai’s international legal team, Caoilfhionn Gallagher KC, told the BBC that it had been a ‘show trial from the start – the script is already written’. 

Hong Kong’s chief executive, John Lee Ka-chiu, hailed the sentencing as ‘deeply gratifying’, and described his crimes as ‘heinous’ and ‘utterly despicable’.

British media tycoon and pro-democracy campaigner Jimmy Lai has been jailed by a Hong Kong court for 20 years

Campaigners have described Mr Lai’s punishment as ‘effectively a death sentence’

Lee wrote in a Facebook post: ‘For a long time, Lai used Apple Daily to poison the minds of citizens, incite hatred, distort facts, deliberately create social division, glorify violence, and openly beg external forces to sanction China and the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.’

The head of Hong Kong police’s National Security Department also defended Lai’s 20-year sentence as ‘appropriate’.