US lawmakers have called on the White House to prioritise the release of Americans wrongfully held in China, some of whom, they said, had been detained for nearly a decade without a fair trial.
The Congressional-Executive Commission on China (CECC), which advises Congress and the US president on human rights and rule of law in China, held a hearing on Wednesday to examine the case of US citizens jailed in Chinese prisons and to explore ways to secure their release.
In his opening remarks, Representative Christopher Smith, the New Jersey Republican who chairs the commission, called the situation urgent.
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“If the Chinese government wants to improve relations with the United States, they should release Americans who are wrongfully imprisoned without condition,” Smith said.
“They should unilaterally end the use of ‘exit bans,’ a form of de facto hostage-taking that violates the Chinese government’s obligations under Article 13 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.”
Smith said the cases of detained Americans ought to be “agenda item No 1 at every meeting the secretary of state takes with Chinese officials”.
No commission member provided any estimate about how many US citizens were being held by China.
But one witness, Peter Humphrey, a Briton and former journalist who himself had spent years in Chinese custody, said his research indicated that as many as 300 may be incarcerated or subject to bans – “mostly just because they are Americans”.
The hearing took place just days after the release of David Lin, a Chinese-born American pastor who had been imprisoned in China for nearly two decades. Lin was arrested in 2006 for contract fraud while trying to establish a Christian training centre.
Throughout Lin’s 18-year imprisonment, his family and the State Department repeatedly contended that his detention was politically motivated. On Sunday, Lin’s daughter, Alice, confirmed his release and safe return to the United States.
“We are overjoyed for the Lin family,” Smith said, “but there are more Americans detained in the PRC than anywhere else in the world.
“Wrongfully detained US nationals are serving long prison sentences – an average of eight years,” he added .
Asked to comment on Wednesday’s hearing, Liu Pengyu, a spokesperson for Beijing’s embassy in Washington, denied that nationality is a factor in any detentions.
“China is a country ruled by law,” Liu said. “The judicial authorities will handle the criminal suspects strictly in accordance with the law, treat them equally regardless of their nationality, and protect their legitimate rights and interests.”
Harrison Li, son of Kai Li, an American arrested in Shanghai in 2016 on espionage charges, said that Lin’s release could signal China’s willingness to discuss other cases.
However, Li also expressed concern that negotiations might be disrupted by the election cycle and a new administration. He urged that US President Joe Biden prioritise discussions in his remaining four months in office.
“No matter who wins November’s presidential election, we will have a change of administration, and we know from experience, unfortunately, that means months or even years where absolutely no progress on these cases will be made, and that’s because communication channels will need to be re-established,” Li said.
Mark Swidan is another American serving a long prison sentence in China, and considered arbitrarily detained by the US State Department. Swidan was detained in 2012 and sentenced to death, accused of drug trafficking.
In written testimony, Katherine Swidan, his mother, criticised the lack of action by successive US administrations, asking “how many more presidents must take office before action is taken”.
“President Obama, President Trump, President Biden – none have brought Mark home. Why do the well-connected seem to have their cases resolved more quickly while families like mine are forgotten?”
Humphrey also testified about prisoner mistreatment. Chinese authorities had accused him of illegally obtaining personal data on a politically connected Chinese woman for his due diligence consultancy. He was arrested in Shanghai in 2013, and spent two years in jail.
“China’s judicial system is a political system of oppression. It is not a system of justice. All of its organs, the police, the prosecution, the judiciary, the prisons and the Chinese lawyers form a single organic whole, all controlled by the Communist Party,” he said.
Humphrey spoke about forced labour in Chinese prisons, claiming that the facilities work “essentially [as] a gulag” – the forced labour camps the Soviet Union was notorious for.
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