Yang Hengjun: Australian-Chinese author suspected of criminal activities endangering state security, says China

An Australian-Chinese author is facing one of the most serious charges in China’s Communist Party regime.

Australian Yang Hengjun is detained in Beijing

An Australian-Chinese author is facing one of the most serious charges in China’s Communist Party regime.

Yang Hengjun was arrested by the Beijing Municipal Sate Security bureau, suspected of criminal activities endangering state security, Hua Chunying said at press conference today.

She said China had informed Australian embassy of Yang’s arrest, and provided due assistance to the embassy to carry out consul duty. She said “the consul communication channel between the two is smooth.”

Miss Hua said she cannot confirm the specific time of when China notified Australian embassy, and said (to a journalist) “I don’t understand why you are so interested in the timing.”

Mr Mo Shaoping, the lawyer employed by Mr Yang’s wife, told The Australian that “Yang’s wife was given legal notice by state security bureau of Beijing Municipality [that was dated] January 16 that Yang was detained suspected of espionage.”

Mr Mo said, according to Chinese legal terms, Yang is “confined to a designated place for interrogation”, not formally arrested.

He added that he had not been able to visit Mr Yang yet.

“According to Chinese law, espionage is a severe crime and could possible lead to severe punishment up to death.”

“However, I haven’t seen the formal legal document from the bureau, and I can not tell the severity of his case; nor I have knowledge of what he is alleged to have done.”

The arrest of the 53-year-old has added to the feeling that visiting China could be unsafe for critics of the government, US based China watcher, Bill Bishop said today.

Writing in the latest edition of his newsletter, Sinocism, today Mr Bishop said it was not known why Yang was arrested.

“It could be related to Australia’s policies towards Huawei for example, it could also be a case of the authorities wanting him due to his overseas writings and that this was a seizure of opportunity as he visited China for the first time in a while,” he said.

“Regardless, it only heightens the feeling that visiting China is unsafe and that the security services may be going after people for what they say outside of China.”

Mr Bishop’s comments come as the Federal Government has confirmed it has received notification of Yang’s arrest at Guangzhou Airport on Saturday.

Questions are being asked why it has taken so long for Chinese officials to confirm his arrest to the Australian Embassy in Beijing when there is an agreement between the two countries that embassies should be notified within three days of the arrest of a citizen from the other’s country.

The arrest of Yang, 53, a novelist and commentator who worked for the Chinese foreign ministry before moving to Australia and becoming a citizen in 2000, came as he arrived from a flight from the US where he has been living for the past few years as a visiting scholar at Columbia University.

Yang had been warned by friends that it was too dangerous for him to travel to China but he had argued that he believed he was safe from arrest as he had kept a low key profile living in New York for the past few years.

His writing has been critical of the Chinese government but in recent years he has avoided interviews and making any public criticism of the Chinese government.

This Minister for Defence, Christopher Pyne, is due to give a press conference on the situation in Beijing today ahead of a meeting with Chinese defence officials later in the day.

He will be meeting his Chinese counterpart General Wei Fenghe in a visit which was meant to be about furthering friendly co operation with China’s defence forces but is now being overshadowed by questions about Yang’s arrest.

Chinese nationalist state media outlet the Global Times carried an article by its editor Hu Xijin on Thursday which appeared to be a warning to people who have Chinese backgrounds.

“Some overseas Chinese, taking advantage of dual nationality, lost sense of the ‘redline’ in China, assuming foreign countries will provide

protections to them,” Mr Hu wrote.