HK Observer | F-words for bookseller’s story: fake and framed

Robert Carroll

Let’s use an f-word: “fake.” And another? How about “framed.” Fake is how the edited, inconsistent confession of publisher Gui Minhai appears to his daughter and to most Hong Kongers. Typical of the style of televised pre-trial confessions on the mainland, Gui’s appearance did nothing to assuage strong doubts in Hong Kong about the true nature of the publisher’s disappearance.
Raising more doubts is one of the latest twists: how Gui disappeared from Thailand. There has been no record at any Thai immigration control points of him leaving Thailand, which is where he was last known to have been, according to his daughter who was informed by Swedish authorities.
That Thai authorities appear to have come up empty in their supposed investigations into the matter smacks of a cover up. However, there have been investigations by British newspaper The Guardian and by Gui’s friends, which, unlike those of the Thai police, did not come up empty.
The Guardian obtained CCTV footage of Gui entering and leaving his building in Pattaya for the last time, along with witness accounts of what happened from staff members on the block. They also traced down a taxi driver who drove Gui and other unidentified individuals on that day. The picture reveals a series of highly suspect events surrounding Gui’s mysterious departure, certainly involving Chinese individuals, which point to an abduction via China-friendly Cambodia.
During Gui’s arrival back at his complex from a shopping trip, CCTV at the building gate shows a casually dressed man appearing from the security area apparently watching the car’s progress. A management employee at the condominium recalled a man who spoke poor Thai waiting at the gate, where he was speaking in Chinese on his phone; then, he claimed to see Gui speaking to the same man and shortly afterwards asking for his shopping to be taken up to his flat. Gui was never seen at the complex again, but made two suspicious calls to his daughter. The first was two weeks later to ask her to her to put food away and secure the flat – no explanation of why he had vanished, despite her several messages asking about his welfare. The second call was the day after to say a friend would come by to pick up his computer.
The “friend” turned out to be four men, only two of whom spoke Thai, who entered Chinese names in the visitor log book. They went to the flat and spent almost half an hour there but did not take the computer.
The saga continued with another highly suspicious turn. The condominium manager, who discovered that Gui was unreachable, called the number the flat’s visitors had used. A taxi driver answered, saying that the four men had left the phone in the cab but had been negotiating a ride to a border town in Cambodia – a place with a reputation for immigration officials who take bribes. The Guardian reported that, soon after, two Beijing-dispatched airplanes were about to arrive to deport some Chinese people who were allegedly fraudsters.
The Guardian then called all of the numbers Gui had used since he vanished. One was from Croatia, another from Togo and the last was from Poland – all were disconnected.
Of course, we had to leave open the possibility that the publisher arranged his own disappearance. On the other hand, going shopping the same day, and not saying anything to his wife and daughter, the latter of whom he was supposed to meet a couple of days after he disappeared, remains suspicious.  And why all the trouble – and expense – for a highly secretive, illicit flight to China when he could have handed himself in at the Chinese embassy or the China Liaison Office in Hong Kong?
The case in China against Gui is also suspicious: a hit and run driving accident where a student was killed. Firstly, the driver was reported to have two different ages. Secondly, that was thirteen years ago. Why so long before any action?
F for “fake” and F for “framed” comes to mind. He was said to have just been about to publish a book about Chinese president Xi Jinping.