Australian-Chinese author and former State Security spy Yang Hengjun, who has been under arrest by Communist Party authorities for 19 months, has refused to make any false confessions to “espionage” charges against him, he said in a message to his family.
According to Reuters, Yang Hengjun, who is being held in a detention center, was allowed to see his lawyer for the first time on Thursday (September 3). This was seen as a sign that his case may soon be transferred to court.
Yang was previously arrested at Guangzhou Baiyun Airport on January 19, 2019, while returning from New York with his family. Since then, his family and lawyers have been unable to visit him. In March of this year, he was formally charged with “espionage. The Australian government strongly opposes the charges against him.
According to Professor Feng Chongyi, an Australian expert on China and a close friend and teacher of Yang Hengjun, Yang Hengjun said in a message to his family that he was innocent and would fight to the end. They can mistreat him, but he will never admit to something he did not do.
This is the first time since his arrest that Yang Hengjun has made his voice known to the outside world. Yang told his lawyer that he had been subjected to long interrogations, sometimes forced to be handcuffed and blindfolded. Yang’s message apparently contradicted reports in the Chinese media that he had confessed to the crime.
Feng Chongyi also stated that, according to the Chinese judicial system, Yang Hengjun’s case is due to go to trial in six weeks.
Yang’s family has hired renowned Chinese human rights lawyers Mo Shaoping and Shang Baojun to defend him, and they have repeatedly asked to meet with him, but have been refused.
It was previously confirmed that National Security officers interrogated Yang Hengjun daily in isolation, handcuffed his ankles and wrists, did not allow friends or relatives to send him any messages of support, and required him to take nine pills a day for alleged health problems such as high blood pressure and kidney complications.
In addition, Australian consular officials met Yang Hengjun via video on Monday. Consular visits have been suspended for the first time this year due to the new coronavirus outbreak.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said Friday that Chinese authorities have been in contact with the Australian government about consular access to Yang Hengjun’s case.
Relations between China and Australia have become increasingly strained after the Australian government called for an independent international investigation into the source of the new coronavirus. Australia’s approach apparently angered Beijing, which subsequently retaliated against Australia on several occasions for trade.
Last month, Chinese authorities arrested another Australian citizen, Cheng Lei. Cheng Lei is an anchor for China’s official English-language CCTV channel, China Global Television Network (CGTN). Although the Chinese authorities informed the Australian Foreign Ministry, they did not disclose the reason for Cheng Lei’s arrest.
The Australian ABC reported in detail about Yang Hengjun’s “complicated life” in March of this year, saying that after graduating from the National Politics Department of Fudan University in Shanghai in 1987, where he had trained many spies for China, he joined the Chinese Ministry of State Security, which had been in existence for only four years, until he came to Australia in 2000 and left. According to his friends, the reason was his declining trust in the Chinese government and his growing interest in a democratic system of governance.
However, Yang’s cover story was that he worked for the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Hainan Provincial People’s Government, and a Chinese company in Hong Kong from 1987 to 1997, when he went to the U.S. Atlantic Council to work on international strategic issues, actually gathering intelligence from U.S. think tanks and members of Congress, before moving to Australia in 2000, essentially separating himself from the Ministry of State Security.
The report indicates that during his 14-plus years at DHS, Yang was engaged in increasingly important assignments, although his position appears to have involved only analysis rather than the more traditional front-line spying work of bribing those with access to foreign secrets.
Professor Chongyi Feng of the University of Technology, who was Yang Hengjun’s PhD supervisor, said he became suspicious of Yang’s background after his first meeting with him and that Yang, then an author, submitted his curriculum vitae and applied to study under him.
Feng Chongyi confirmed that years later he was able to speak with someone familiar with Yang Hengjun’s experience to confirm that Yang had indeed served in the Chinese Ministry of State Security.
However, Feng Chongyi believes that when Yang Hengjun left the MSS in 2000, he completely abandoned his ties to Chinese intelligence and transformed his growing disenchantment with the Chinese system into a pro-democracy Internet writer and critical political commentator. Yang Hengjun has written extensively about Western democracy over the years and calls himself a “democracy peddler.
According to Feng Chongyi, Yang Hengjun’s arrest last year was most likely due to his pro-democracy activities and his betrayal of the Chinese Communist Party’s intelligence system.
Feng Chongyi is also the custodian of a letter Yang wrote in 2011 explaining why he decided to become a pro-democracy activist.
“Through my articles, tens of thousands of young people in China have been awakened …… who have shown me hope for China,” Yang wrote.
In recent years, however, some people on the Internet have accused Yang Hengjun of being a “Chinese Communist spy,” especially his wife, Yuan Xiaorian (Yuan Ruijuan), who was once a Chinese Internet sensation and popular microblogger, “Dye Xiang. “She is known for her support of the Chinese government and criticism of public intellectuals, and is one of the representatives of the Maoist leftists, known as “Big Five Mao” for her support of the Chinese Communist Party and one-party dictatorship and her disparagement of democracy. However, Yuan Xiaofei is now also a victim of the dictatorship.
While Yang Hengjun was detained at Guangzhou Baiyun Airport in January 2019, Yuan was also briefly detained in Shanghai and subsequently questioned by the Chinese secret police about her husband’s ties to Western intelligence agencies, and may face charges of endangering national security. Yuan Xiaomi, an Australian resident, attempted to fly to Australia, but was intercepted and banned from leaving the country on “suspicion of endangering national security.
On April 9 last year, a video of Yuan Xiaoxiang crying about her husband’s arrest circulated on the Internet, calling on the Australian government to pay attention to Yang Hengjun’s human rights.
The Australian government reported that the Chinese authorities had not provided any evidence to substantiate allegations that Yang Hengjun was working for Western intelligence services. In August of last year, Australia’s foreign minister took the unusual step of publicly stating that Yang Hengjun had never worked for an Australian intelligence agency.
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