HONG KONG: Former Hong Kong leader Donald Tsang was hospitalized Friday after losing an appeal bid against a misconduct conviction in one of the city’s most high-profile corruption cases.
Tsang was jailed last year after being found guilty of failing to disclose his plans to lease a luxury flat from a major investor in a broadcaster, which was later granted a license from the government while he was leader.
The 73-year-old, who held the leadership post of chief executive for seven years from 2005, is the most senior city official ever to be convicted in a criminal trial and the highest-ranking one to be put behind bars.
His trial came at a time when residents were losing faith in Hong Kong’s leaders after a string of corruption cases fueled suspicions over links between public officials and business figures.
Tsang was released on bail last year after two months in prison, pending the appeal.
The Court of Appeal sent him back to prison Friday, but shortly after he was led out of the courtroom by security guards, Tsang was taken away in an ambulance.
Local media reported that he had “felt unwell” and was wearing an oxygen mask.
The Court of Appeal judgment said Friday that: “It defies belief that someone with the applicant’s long experience and background in government service could have overlooked the need to make a declaration of interest in these circumstances.”
It added that Tsang’s misconduct was “particularly serious, given his pre-eminent position in the community and the harm his actions will have engendered among the people of Hong Kong in their confidence in the way the Government does its business.”
However, the court reduced Tsang’s sentence from 20 months to 12 months, saying the previous judge’s starting point for sentencing was too high.
Speaking outside court after the judgment was delivered and before Tsang was taken to hospital, his wife Selina said she was “disappointed and heartbroken.”
“After discussing with the lawyers later, we will decide the next move as soon as possible,” she told reporters.
Prosecutors during Tsang’s trial characterized his conduct as an abuse of power to further his own personal interests.
In 2012, he apologized over separate allegations that he had accepted inappropriate gifts from business friends in the form of trips on luxury yachts and private jets.
His former deputy Rafael Hui was jailed for seven-and-a-half years in 2014 after being found guilty of taking bribes from Hong Kong property tycoon Thomas Kwok.
Former Hong Kong leader hospitalized after losing appeal for misconduct jailing
Former Hong Kong leader hospitalized after losing appeal for misconduct jailing
Carney says Canada has no plans to pursue free trade agreement with China as Trump threatens tariffs
Carney says Canada has no plans to pursue free trade agreement with China as Trump threatens tariffs
TORONTO: Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said Sunday his country has no intention of pursuing a free trade deal with China. He was responding to US President Donald Trump’s threat to impose a 100 percent tariff on goods imported from Canada if America’s northern neighbor went ahead with a trade deal with Beijing.
Carney said his recent agreement with China merely cuts tariffs on a few sectors that were recently hit with tariffs.
Trump claims otherwise, posting that “China is successfully and completely taking over the once Great Country of Canada. So sad to see it happen. I only hope they leave Ice Hockey alone! President DJT”
The prime minister said under the free trade agreement with the US and Mexico there are commitments not to pursue free trade agreements with nonmarket economies without prior notification.
“We have no intention of doing that with China or any other nonmarket economy,” Carney said. “What we have done with China is to rectify some issues that developed in the last couple of years.”
In 2024, Canada mirrored the United States by putting a 100 percent tariff on electric vehicles from Beijing and a 25 percent tariff on steel and aluminum. China had responded by imposing 100 percent import taxes on Canadian canola oil and meal and 25 percent on pork and seafood.
Breaking with the United States this month during a visit to China, Carney cut its 100 percent tariff on Chinese electric cars in return for lower tariffs on those Canadian products.
Carney has said there would be an initial annual cap of 49,000 vehicles on Chinese EV exports coming into Canada at a tariff rate of 6.1 percent, growing to about 70,000 over five years. He noted there was no cap before 2024. He also has said the initial cap on Chinese EV imports was about 3 percent of the 1.8 million vehicles sold in Canada annually and that, in exchange, China is expected to begin investing in the Canadian auto industry within three years.
Trump posted a video Sunday in which the chief executive of the Canadian Vehicle Manufacturers’ Association warns there will be no Canadian auto industry without US access, while noting the Canadian market alone is too small to justify large scale manufacturing from China.
“A MUST WATCH. Canada is systematically destroying itself. The China deal is a disaster for them. Will go down as one of the worst deals, of any kind, in history. All their businesses are moving to the USA. I want to see Canada SURVIVE AND THRIVE! President DJT,” Trump posted on social media.
Trump’s post on Saturday said that if Carney “thinks he is going to make Canada a ‘Drop Off Port’ for China to send goods and products into the United States, he is sorely mistaken.”
“We can’t let Canada become an opening that the Chinese pour their cheap goods into the U.S,” US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on ABC’s “This Week.”
“We have a , but based off — based on that, which is going to be renegotiated this summer, and I’m not sure what Prime Minister Carney is doing here, other than trying to virtue-signal to his globalist friends at Davos.”
Trump’s threat came amid an escalating war of words with Carney as the Republican president’s push to acquire Greenland strained the NATO alliance.
Carney has emerged as a leader of a movement for countries to find ways to link up and counter the US under Trump. Speaking in Davos before Trump, Carney said, “Middle powers must act together because if you are not at the table, you are on the menu” and he warned about coercion by great powers — without mentioning Trump’s name. The prime minister received widespread praise and attention for his remarks, upstaging Trump at the World Economic Forum.
Trump’s push to acquire Greenland has come after he has repeatedly needled Canada over its sovereignty and suggested it also be absorbed into the United States as a 51st state. He posted an altered image on social media this week showing a map of the United States that included Canada, Venezuela, Greenland and Cuba as part of its territory.
