'Missing' bookseller Lee Bo returned to Hong Kong

Hong Kong : Hong Kong bookseller Lee Bo who disappeared from the city and surfaced in mainland China has returned, police said Thursday, the latest twist in a case that has provoked anger over China's interference in the city.

British citizen Lee is one of five Hong Kong booksellers known to go "missing" in recent months the other four are now under criminal investigation on the mainland.

The men all worked for the Mighty Current publishing house in Hong Kong, which produced salacious titles about political intrigue and love affairs at the highest levels of Chinese politics. 

Lee's case caused the greatest outcry because he disappeared from Hong Kong, prompting accusations that Chinese law enforcement agents were operating in the semi-autonomous city, which is illegal under its constitution. 

The other four booksellers went missing from Thailand or southern mainland China. 

"Immigration department and police met and took statement separately with Lee Bo, who had returned to Hong Kong from the mainland this afternoon," a government statement released late Thursday said.

Lee had been handed over to immigration officials at the Lok Ma Chau border point in northern Hong Kong, the statement said. 

Lee, 65, was last seen at a Hong Kong book warehouse before his disappearance, but spoke publicly for the first time on Chinese television late last month saying he had gone to the mainland of his own accord.

Britain however had said in February it believed he had been "involuntarily removed to the mainland" in what it described as a "serious breach" of an agreement signed with Beijing before Hong Kong was handed back to China in 1997, a deal that protects Hong Kong's freedoms for 50 years.

That earned the ire of Beijing, which blasted Britain for interfering in its domestic affairs.

Thursday's government statement again insisted Lee had "returned to the mainland by his own means voluntarily and it was not an abduction".