Chinese-born Australian writer and businessman Yang Hengjun's recent suspended death sentence on espionage charges is likely to add to growing concerns about the risks foreign nationals face living in, working in and visiting China, analysts say.
Yang, a democracy advocate and spy novelist, was sentenced earlier this month. On Wednesday, his family released a statement saying that they would not file an appeal to the ruling due to a lack of trust in China's judicial system and the hope of securing "adequate and supervised medical care" for him.
"Yang's decision to forgo the appeals process does not in any way change the fact that he is both innocent and morally unbreakable, [and] we, family and close friends, strongly support Yang's decision to waive his legal right to appeal the suspended death sentence handed down to him," they wrote in the statement.
Feng Chongyi, an expert on Chinese politics at the University of Technology Sydney and Yang's former academic adviser, told VOA in a phone interview that the case will have ripple effects.
"The Chinese government's decision to give Yang Hengjun a suspended death sentence will create a chilling effect among democratic countries and discourage foreign nationals from doing business in China," Feng said.
He added that under China's anti-espionage law, which was amended in July 2023 to give Chinese authorities more power to punish threats against national security, the Chinese government categorizes commercial information and news as "state secrets," and that any foreigner could be treated as a spy under the law.
Source: Beijing Bulletin
