Hong Kong bookseller Lam Wing-kee dies in Taipei at 70

Lam Wing-kee, the Hong Kong bookseller whose abduction by Chinese authorities in 2015 jolted the city, died in Taipei at 70 after a years-long battle with lung cancer. His case became one of the clearest early warnings that Beijing was willing to reach beyond mainland China to silence criticism, even inside a city promised a separate legal order.

Lam owned and later managed Causeway Bay Books, a Hong Kong bookstore known for selling publications critical of the Chinese Communist Party that were banned in mainland China. In 2015, Lam and four associates went missing and were later revealed to have been detained by Chinese authorities, a disappearance that drew international attention and alarmed Hong Kong residents already wary of pressure from the mainland.

After he resurfaced in Hong Kong, Lam said he had been kidnapped and blindfolded at the border and later held in solitary confinement. He eventually relocated to Taiwan and reopened Causeway Bay Books there, turning his own experience into a public challenge to Beijing’s control over speech. His 2016 account of the detention made him a symbol of resistance to the crackdown on free expression and helped turn the bookseller case into a defining example of how far Chinese authorities could reach.

Lam also stayed visible in Hong Kong politics after his release. He marched in the 2019 protests against a proposed extradition bill with China, a movement that widened fears that the city’s autonomy was being steadily eroded. His appearance in the streets linked the bookstore case to a broader generation of activists, journalists and publishers who saw the line between Hong Kong and the mainland growing thinner.

Taiwan President William Lai paid tribute after Lam’s death, writing on Facebook: “I want to express my deepest condolences to his family, friends and all those who care about freedom and democracy in Hong Kong.” Lam’s death closes the life of a man whose kidnapping, defiance and exile made him an early witness to the political transformation of Hong Kong and a reminder of how Beijing’s reach continued to shape the city far beyond 2015.