Hong Kong was played during a rugby match in Incheon, between the Hong Kong and South Korea rugby teams. Lee said that the "song that was played was closely connected to the 2019 violence and disturbances, and advocacy for Hong Kong's independence," and said that the Organised Crime and Triad Bureau would investigate the matter. In December 2022, Lee said that he would ask Google to remove the song from search results when querying for the national anthem of Hong Kong. After Google denied the request, Lee said that there was a legal basis for Google to do so. Jimmy Lai After the Department of Justice lost multiple appeals in an attempt to block Jimmy Lai from hiring Tim Owen as his lawyer, Lee said that he would ask Beijing's National People's Congress Standing Committee (NPCSC) to interpret the national security law to potentially disallow the hiring of foreign lawyers in national security cases. Earlier, three Court of Final Appeal judges, including Chief Justice Andrew Cheung had ruled that Lai be allowed to hire Owen. Lee dismissed concerns that his move to ask the NPCSC to rule in the matter would damage the city's legal reputation, but professor Johannes Chan Man-mun, former law dean of HKU, said that the NPCSC interpretation "may severely compromise Hong Kong as an international city." Lee also said "The most appropriate way forward is for the NPCSC to issue an interpretation and the case is handled accordingly. This is the approach that is in the best interest of this case and our legal system." When asked about if the decision to get the NPCSC involved would be unfair to Lai, Lee did not comment. On 28 December 2022, Lee thanked Beijing for including the NCPSC interpretation on their next meeting's agenda. On 30 December 2022, the NPCSC ruled that the Chief Executive now has permission to decide whether or not defendants could hire foreign lawyers; Lee welcomed the ruling and said that foreign lawyers could be a threat due to them coming from "hostile" countries. In January 2023, Lee said that the Committee for Safeguarding National Security, a committee he chairs, supported changing local laws to potentially ban foreign lawyers from national security cases. Article 23 On 12 April 2022, Lee stated that implementing security legislation under Article 23 of the Basic Law would be a top priority for him. Lee later said in July