HONG KONG: Onetime media magnate Jimmy Lai won a rare victory in his legal battles when a Hong Kong appellate court on February 27 quashed fraud convictions against him.

However, Lai, 78, will remain in prison because of another case from weeks ago, in which he was sentenced to 20 years under a China-imposed national security law. That case happened more than five years after he was first arrested under a national security law that was used for years to crack down on many leading activists in Hong Kong.

The conviction that was overturned on February 26 came from an earlier fraud case. Prosecutors said that a consulting company controlled by Lai had used office space rented by his media company for publishing and printing.

In 2022, a lower court judge sentenced Lai to five years and nine months in prison after finding him guilty of two counts of fraud.

The judge said that Lai and his co-defendant, Wong Wai-keung, had breached the lease agreement as they did not reveal that the consulting firm was using the office space. The judge said Lai had used his media company to protect himself and fined him 2 million Hong Kong dollars.

However, judges at the Court of Appeal said that although Apple Daily Printing broke the lease by allowing the firm to use part of the space, it did not have a legal duty to report this breach. They added that even if there had been such a duty, Lai and Wong could not legally be held responsible for it.

The appeal judges said the trial judge's reasoning for holding them responsible was not convincing. They also said prosecutors had failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendants made false statements. As a result, they canceled both the convictions and the sentences.

Neither Lai nor Wong appeared in court for the ruling.

This decision could reduce Lai's total time in prison. In his separate national security case, judges had ordered that only two years of the fraud sentence would run concurrently with his 18-year national security sentence, with the rest added afterward.

The government said the Department of Justice would carefully review the ruling and decide whether to appeal. It added that although the court held the lease breach did not constitute fraud, it did not change the fact that Lai had used the office space for personal purposes that were not permitted.

His long sentence has led to fears that he could spend the rest of his life in prison.

Lai's children hope that a visit by U.S. President Donald Trump to Beijing might help secure their father's release. The White House has confirmed that Trump will travel to China from March 31 to April 2 to meet Chinese President Xi Jinping.

U.K. Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper said Lai was punished for exercising his right to free speech and urged the Hong Kong authorities to release him on humanitarian grounds.

Chinese and Hong Kong officials have defended the sentence in the national security case, saying it follows the rule of law and that the security law is necessary to maintain stability in the city.