Australian writer Yang Hengjun charged with spying in China | World news


The Australian novelist and former Chinese diplomat Yang Hengjun has been charged with espionage in Beijing.

Yang has been detained in China since January when he was arrested in Guangzhou. He is being held in Beijing in a ministry of state security detention centre.

The Guardian has confirmed that the Australian embassy was informed by the Beijing national security bureau on Monday afternoon that Yang had been formally charged, “suspected of committing espionage crimes”.

Yang’s lawyer Rob Stary confirmed his client had been charged with “a single act of espionage”, though there were no details of the alleged act. It is not clear whether the charge relates to his work as a writer, blogger or democracy activist. It is also unclear whether Australia is the country he is alleged to have spied for.

Stary said Yang’s legal team held “particular anxiety” over the fact he had now been charged with an offence that potentially carried the death penalty. Julian McMahon, who represented Van Nguyen and members of the Bali Nine facing capital charges, has been engaged to represent Yang.

There is a range of espionage offences under Chinese law, carrying penalties from three years in jail to the death penalty. Previously, it had been speculated Yang might face lesser charges of endangering national security.

Yang, a naturalised Australian citizen since 2002, was initially held under a system known as “residential surveillance at a designated location”, a type of secret detention in which authorities can deny access to lawyers and family, and restrict external communication.

In July he was moved to a Beijing detention centre in the lead-up to expected charges. Australian consular officials have been allowed one half-hour visit each month.

Chinese-born Yang was formerly a diplomat for the China’s ministry of foreign affairs, before working in the private sector in Hong Kong and moving to the US, then to Australia.

A novelist under the nom de plume Wei Shi, Yang has been a popular blogger, political commentator and agitator for democratic reforms in China for more than a decade.

“I’m like an old auntie jabbering on, always promoting democracy and repeating its benefits,” he wrote in an article in 2014. “Dictatorship is always torn down in one night, but good democracy isn’t built in one night.”

Australia has consistently criticised his treatment at the hands of Chinese authorities. In July the foreign affairs minister, Marise Payne, said the Australian government was “deeply disappointed” Yang had been transferred to criminal detention.

“The Australian government has raised its concerns about Dr Yang’s case regularly with China at senior levels,” Payne said. “I have written twice to China’s foreign minister, state councillor Wang Yi, to request a fair and transparent resolution to this matter and that Dr Yang be granted access to his lawyers. This has not occurred.”

The president of the Australian Law Council, Arthur Moses, met China’s vice-minister of justice this month and again raised Yang’s case. “Detainees like Dr Yang must be treated in a fair and transparent manner,” Moses said,

In a speech to the presidents of law associations in Asia, Moses said China lacked an independent judiciary and there was no rule of law.

Dr Feng Chongyi, an academic at the University of Technology Sydney and a friend of Yang’s, was detained for a week and interrogated by authorities in China over a study trip in 2017. He said there was no evidence to support any allegation of spying against Yang.

“I am furious at the news,” he said. “This is outrageous political persecution. I hope the international community will join hands to demand the release of Yang.”

A spokesman for China’s ministry of foreign affairs, Geng Shuang, said Yang’s case was proceeding “in accordance with the law” and that the state had “fully guaranteed” the protection of his rights.

But observers argue there has been no transparent process and the charges appear politically motivated.

Yaqiu Wang, a China researcher for Human Rights Watch, said: “While we don’t know the details of Yang’s case, the Chinese government has a record of deploying vague ‘national security’ charges to prosecute peaceful critics.”

Yang’s wife, Yuan Xiaoliang, an Australian permanent resident, has been banned from leaving China.


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