{"id":15106,"date":"2024-02-05T12:46:30","date_gmt":"2024-02-05T12:46:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/2024\/02\/05\/china-hands-australian-writer-a-suspended-death-penalty-in-a-move-canberra-condemns\/"},"modified":"2024-02-05T12:46:30","modified_gmt":"2024-02-05T12:46:30","slug":"china-hands-australian-writer-a-suspended-death-penalty-in-a-move-canberra-condemns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/2024\/02\/05\/china-hands-australian-writer-a-suspended-death-penalty-in-a-move-canberra-condemns\/","title":{"rendered":"China hands Australian writer a suspended death penalty in a move Canberra condemns"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

A Chinese-Australian writer has received a suspended death penalty in China, five years after he was detained on espionage charges, according to Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong. <\/p>\n

Yang Hengjun, an Australian citizen and democracy activist born in China, was sentenced Monday by a court in Beijing, Wong said in a\u00a0statement, adding that the Australian government was \u201cappalled\u201d by the sentence. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe understand this can be commuted to life imprisonment after two years if the individual does not commit any serious crimes in the two-year period,\u201d Wong said. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis is harrowing news for Dr Yang, his family and all who have supported him. Our thoughts are with them.\u201d <\/p>\n

Yang, 58, was\u00a0detained in 2019\u00a0at the airport when he arrived in the southern city of Guangzhou with his wife from New York to see family in China. <\/p>\n

He was later charged with espionage\u00a0\u2013 accusations he has denied. <\/p>\n

Yang\u2019s case has been shrouded in secrecy. Chinese authorities have offered no details on his charges \u2013 including which country he was accused of spying for. <\/p>\n

In 2021, his trial was held behind closed doors\u00a0in a heavily guarded court in Beijing, to which Australian diplomats were denied entry. The verdict and sentence were repeatedly delayed. <\/p>\n

China\u2019s court system is notoriously opaque \u2013 especially on cases involving national security \u2013 and has a conviction rate of above 99%, according to legal observers. <\/p>\n

Yang has suffered from poor health in detention. Last year, Yang said he feared he might die in prison, after a large cyst was found on his kidney. <\/p>\n

Australia has advocated for Yang with China \u201cat every opportunity, and at the highest levels,\u201d said Wong, the Australian foreign minister, in her statement. <\/p>\n

She vowed to continue to press for Yang\u2019s interests and wellbeing, including appropriate medical treatment, and provide consular assistance to him and his family. <\/p>\n

At a news conference Monday, Wong said she had summoned China\u2019s ambassador, Xiao Qian, to explain the sentence, while acknowledging it was a \u201cdecision of the Chinese legal system.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cAll Australians want to see Dr Yang reunited with his family,\u201d Wong said, adding that Yang has \u201coptions\u201d to appeal the sentence. <\/p>\n

Feng Chongyi, Yang\u2019s friend and former PhD supervisor in Australia, called his sentence a \u201cbarbarous act by the Chinese Communist regime.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cYang is punished by the Chinese government for his criticism of human rights abuses in China and his advocacy for universal values such as human rights, democracy and the rule of law,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis is outraging political persecution and an unacceptable arbitrary imprisonment of an innocent Australian citizen.\u201d <\/p>\n

Feng also expressed concern for Yang\u2019s health, saying he is now \u201ccritically ill\u201d and calling on the Australian government to arrange medical parole for Yang and bring him back to Australia as soon as possible. <\/p>\n

\u2018Alarming\u2019 sentence<\/h2>\n

Yang worked as an official with the Chinese Foreign Ministry before emigrating to Australia. <\/p>\n

Before his detention, he routinely posted satirical commentaries critical of the Chinese government to his nearly 130,000 followers on X, previously known as Twitter. He also wrote a series of spy novels. <\/p>\n

Though he holds Australian citizenship, Yang is known to spend most of his time in the United States, where he was a visiting scholar at Columbia University in New York. <\/p>\n

Yang\u2019s sentence was also condemned by human rights groups. <\/p>\n

Daniela Gavshon, Australia director at Human Rights Watch, said the sentence was \u201ccatastrophic\u201d for Yang and his family and called for \u201cstronger action\u201d from Canberra to increase pressure on Beijing. <\/p>\n

\u201cAfter years of arbitrary detention, allegations of torture, a closed and unfair trial without access to his own choice of lawyers \u2013 a sentence as severe as this is alarming,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt shines a light\u00a0on Beijing\u2019s opaque criminal justice system, which the Chinese Communist Party controls.\u201d <\/p>\n

It is not the first time the fate of Australians caught up in national security cases have sparked tensions between Beijing and Canberra. <\/p>\n

Last October, Australian TV anchor Cheng Lei was released by China and returned home to her family more than three years after she was detained on opaque espionage charges. <\/p>\n

Cheng, a former business anchor for China\u2019s state broadcaster CGTN and mother of two, was accused of illegally supplying state secrets overseas. <\/p>\n

Beijing did not reveal details of the allegations against Cheng throughout her three years of detention, and the Chinese court delayed handing down verdict multiple times. <\/p>\n\n

This post appeared first on cnn.com<\/div>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A Chinese-Australian writer has received a suspended death penalty in China, five years after he was detained on espionage charges, according to Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong. Yang Hengjun, an Australian citizen and democracy activist born in China, was sentenced Monday by a court in Beijing, Wong said in a\u00a0statement, adding that the Australian government <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":15107,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-15106","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15106","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15106"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15106\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15107"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15106"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15106"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15106"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}