US-based China scholar on trial for spying

Reuters

BEIJING - A US-based Chinese scholar prominent in pro-democracy circles went on trial behind closed doors in Beijing on Monday charged with illegal entry and spying for Taiwan, his wife said.

The case of Yang Jianli has dented China’s attempts to portray itself as a more open country with a forward-looking administration, but observers say the trial was unlikely to affect increasing investment.

“All of us who want to see China stand tall in the world of justice as well as that of business will keep our fingers crossed,” said Jerome Cohen and Jared Genser, Yang’s legal advisers, in a commentary provided to Reuters.

Yang’s trial comes after the US Senate last week condemned his 15-month detention and called for his immediate and unconditional release.

But China has rebuffed international criticism, saying other countries should mind their own business.

Yang’s wife was not optimistic.

“Chances of the court meting out a not guilty (verdict) are small. We’re worried,” his wife, Christina Fu, told Reuters by telephone from Boston.

A court spokesman could provide no information on the case.

Yang’s lawyers said last week that their client planned to plead not guilty to the charges before the Beijing Number Two Intermediate People’s Court.

Yang, now 40 years old and a permanent US resident, was arrested in April 2002 after allegedly entering China on a friend’s passport and travelling for a week on a fake identity card to observe labour unrest in the northeastern rust belt.

There was uncertainty over what sentence he might face. His family said he could be sentenced to death if convicted of spying, but lawyer Mo Shaoping said his client faced a maximum of life in prison if found guilty.

Yang could also be expelled -- as was US-based Chinese sociologist Gao Zhan in 2001 after a Chinese court convicted her of spying for Taiwan.

Fu, who has been lobbying the White House, the US Congress and the State Department to help win her husband’s release, said she would continue the fight.

Yang’s brother and sister travelled to Beijing from their home in eastern Shandong, but Fu said they had been barred from attending the trial.

She said her husband had not been handcuffed for Monday’s initial appearance, but said witnesses had told her he covered his head with his hands while being taken to court.

Yang earned a doctorate in political economy from Harvard University and another in mathematics from the University of California at Berkeley.

After returning from the United States in 1989 to participate in the pro-democracy demonstrations that were crushed by the army in June that year, China blacklisted Yang and prevented him from coming back.

He is the second exiled Chinese dissident to be tried this year on charges of spying for Taiwan.

In February, a court in the southern boom-town of Shenzhen jailed US-based democracy activist Wang Bingzhang for life after convicting him on terrorism and espionage charges. It was the first time those charges had been used against democracy activists.

--------------------------
Source: "Reuters".