Exclusive | Exclusive: email reveals Lee Po feared Gui Minhai kidnapped by Chinese agents before he himself disappeared
Both Lee and Gui later denied in mainland China that any abduction had taken place – but an email obtained by the South China Morning Post says otherwise
In an explosive twist to the case of the five Causeway Bay booksellers who went missing last year, one of the key figures involved said he feared his associate had been abducted by mainland Chinese agents, only for both of them to deny it later, the Post has learned.
The Post has obtained an email by Lee Po dated November 10 to Gui Minhai’s daughter, Angela, in which Lee Po wrote to say that her father, who disappeared while on holiday in October in Pattaya, Thailand, “was taken by special agents from China for political reasons”. That was before Lee himself disappeared at the end of December.
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“I write to you concerning the whereabouts of Michael. I wonder if you have known that he has been missing for more than 20 days, we fear that he was taken by special agents from China for political reasons,” the email reads, referring to Gui’s English name.
“It’s very little we can do to help Michael because we are not his next of kin. I then think of you, perhaps you can do something, and there are a lot of Michael’s friends [who] are ready to help if you need them. Do tell me what you think and what you want us to do.”
The email contradicts Lee’s story weeks after he disappeared. In a letter he wrote earlier to his wife, Sophie Choi Ka-ping, Lee blamed Gui for his predicament, describing him as a “morally unacceptable person” who had a “complicated personal history”.