HONG KONG – A Hong Kong court will deliver its verdict on Monday in the trial of former pro-democracy media mogul Jimmy Lai , who's charged with conspiracies to commit sedition and collusion with foreign forces in a case that marks how much the semi-autonomous Chinese city has changed since Beijing began a wide-ranging crackdown on dissent five years ago.

Lai, 78, was arrested in 2020 under a national security law imposed by Chinese authorities to quell the massive anti-government protests that rocked the city in 2019.

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Lai's 156-day trial is being closely watched by foreign governments and political observers as a test of the judicial independence and media freedom in the former British colony, which was promised it could maintain its Western-style civil libert

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