U.S.-Based China Scholar on Trial for Spying

Benjamin Kang Lim

BEIJING (Reuters) - China held a three-hour closed-door trial on Monday for a Boston-based Chinese scholar on charges of spying for Taiwan, his wife said, in a case that has drawn international criticism of Beijing's legal system.

Yang Jianli, 40, a permanent U.S. resident and pro-democracy activist, pleaded not guilty to the charges, which included illegally entering China, and while the timing of a decision was unclear, most expected the court to return a guilty verdict.

The Beijing No. 2 Intermediate People's Court held the trial behind closed doors and would deliver its verdict soon, Yang's wife Christina Fu said from Washington.

Fu was convinced her husband was innocent, but was not optimistic the court would agree.

"Chances of the court meting out a not guilty (verdict) are small. We're worried," Fu, a U.S. national and researcher at Harvard Medical School, told Reuters from Washington.

Fu said after the trial ended: "They did not have anything substantial to prove Yang Jianli was a spy."

A court spokesman could provide no information on the case. Fu said the court warned Yang's lawyer Mo Shaoping that revealing any information from the trial could constitute the leaking of state secrets.

Acquittals of government critics are extremely rare in China.

"That Mr. Yang will be convicted is not in doubt," said Jerome Cohen and Jared Genser, Yang's legal advisers, in a commentary provided to Reuters. They said China's conviction rate for political cases was close to 100 percent.

OBSERVE UNREST

Yang was arrested in April 2002 after entering China on a friend's passport and traveling for a week on a fake identity card to observe labor unrest in the northeastern rust belt.

It was uncertain what the sentence might be. His family said he could be sentenced to death if convicted of spying, but lawyer Mo said his client faced up to life in prison if found guilty.

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

The U.S. 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.

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

Yang's brother and sister traveled to Beijing from their home in eastern Shandong, but were barred from attending the trial, she said.

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 barred his return.

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 U.S.-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.

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Source: "Reuters".