Writer and blogger Yang Hengjun has been imprisoned in China since 2019 on charges of espionage. Australia files its objections to the conviction of its citizen.
in China pro-democracy writer and blogger Yang Hengjun has received a suspended death sentence, reports the news agencies AFP and Reuters.
Yang has been charged with espionage crimes, but China has not disclosed which country he allegedly spied for. No other details of the case have been made public.
According to the AFP news agency, the Australian government, which reported on the matter, described the news as “infuriating”.
“The Australian government is outraged by this outcome,” the country's foreign minister Penny Wong told a press conference.
The verdict was also confirmed to Reuters by a Beijing-based human rights lawyer who has followed the case but did not want to be named.
Yang is an Australian citizen who was born in China. The Australian government said it would invite the Chinese ambassador to hear Australia's objection on the matter.
Conditional the death sentence will be changed to life imprisonment after two years, a researcher working in Sydney tells Reuters Feng Chongyi.
Yang, who worked in New York, was arrested in 2019 when he was at Guangzhou Airport. Yang's capture coincided with a cooling of relations between Australia and China.
China released another Australian of Chinese descent Cheng Lei last year the Prime Minister of Australia Anthony Albanese in connection with the visit, so hope for Yang's release was also sustained.
In captivity, Yang has reportedly suffered from health problems. Researcher Feng considers the sentence grossly unfair and urges the Australian government to seek parole for Yang on medical grounds.
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