The 78-year-old outspoken critic of China’s ruling Communist Party awaits sentencing Monday after being convicted in December of conspiring to commit sedition and collude with foreign forces. Observers say his landmark trial came to symbolise a crackdown that began in 2020 on press and other freedoms that has changed Hong Kong, the former British colony that returned to China’s control in 1997. The Hong Kong government insists Lai’s case has nothing to do with press freedom, but instead is an example of righteousness upheld by the law. A migrant from mainland China, he made a fortune in the garment industry in Hong Kong and later founded the Apple Daily newspaper, where he wrote articles criticising the Chinese and Hong Kong governments for limiting freedoms. The publication eventually was shuttered and his words became trial evidence. Here is what to know about his unusual journey to political activism that has ended, at least for the moment, in prison. Story continues below this ad Lai was born in 1947 in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou, once …