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A sign for Causeway Bay Books hangs outside the bookstore. Photo: EPA

Letter to wife from vanished Hong Kong bookseller Lee Bo throws up more questions than answers

Sophie Choi Ka-ping says she believes letter was real and that Lee had not been under pressure, but lawmakers fear otherwise

A letter said to have been written to his wife by the missing Hong Kong bookseller reassuring her of his safety in the wake of his mysterious disappearance has sparked more questions than it has provided answers.

Although Sophie Choi Ka-ping, wife of Lee Bo, a shareholder in Causeway Bay Books, which offers a range of titles banned on the mainland, said yesterday she believed the letter was real and that Lee had not been under pressure to write it, lawmakers feared otherwise.

“He has resisted going to the mainland the whole time [in the past]. Why would he suddenly go to the mainland in his own way?”Democratic Party lawmaker James To Kun-sun said, referring to what Lee wrote. “And why didn’t he just use his home return permit to do so?”

The saga of Lee’s disappearance took a dramatic twist on Monday when Choi suddenly withdrew a request she had previously made for police help to locate Lee, claiming she had been in touch with her husband after he vanished last Wednesday.

Deepening the mystery, Taiwan’s Central News Agency published what it said was a handwritten letter faxed by Lee to a bookstore colleague.

That letter stated Lee “had to handle the issue concerned urgently and could not let outsiders know”. He also said he “returned to the mainland my own way and am working with the concerned parties in an investigation which may take a while”.

The state-run Global Times newspaper issued an editorial yesterday offering a hint on Beijing’s stance on the issue. The piece stated that Lee’s letter had busted rumours the bookseller had been kidnapped by mainland enforcement agencies.

“Although Causeway Bay Books was opened in Hong Kong, the harm it has done against the country has already entered the mainland. Lee Bo knows it well. He was probably willing to cooperate with the investigation in a “low profile” way. It is not a good thing for Lee himself and his book store’s business that the Hong Kong media has gone all over it,” the editorial said.

To said on a radio programme that even if mainland officers did not actually drag Lee away, but instead “arranged” for him to visit the mainland, it would be considered they had crossed the border to take enforcement action.

But New People’s Party deputy chairman Michael Tien Puk-sun disagreed.

“If [mainland] law enforcement agents persuaded him to have a talk with them [on the mainland], then he would have needed to assess the situation himself. In this case, I don’t think the agents should be considered as having crossed the border to carry out any action,” said Tien, who is also a Hong Kong delegate to the National People’s Congress.

However, Tien said he had already written to the head of the Shenzhen Municipal Public Security Bureau to ask if any Hong Kong people were being detained there.

Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying stressed earlier this week that, under the Basic Law, only Hong Kong legal enforcement agencies had the legal authority to enforce laws in Hong Kong.

Lee Cheuk-yan, secretary of the Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China, said the letter pointed to the likelihood that Lee had been placed under investigation by mainland agents.

But New People’s Party chairwoman and former security secretary Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee said the letter showed Lee had not been detained by mainland authorities because he would not be allowed to fax or phone if he had.

Another pro-Beijing lawmaker, Priscilla Leung Mei-fun, said that based on past experience, mainland law enforcement agencies would not take action against Hong Kong suspects in the city. She cited the example of gangster “Big Spender” Cheung Tze-keung, saying mainland law enforcement agencies had had to lure him back to the mainland before arresting him.

Lee was last seen last Wednesday in a Chai Wan warehouse.

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