Australia’s Morrison Urges Transparency as China Charges Writer

(Bloomberg) --

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison called for transparency after Chinese authorities moved to prosecute writer Yang Hengjun, one of its citizens who was arrested last year on suspicion of espionage.

Yang, an Australian citizen, was detained in the southern city of Guangzhou in January 2019 after a flight from New York and is now facing prosecution on “charges yet to be announced,” Australia’s foreign ministry said in a statement Saturday.

“We’re obviously keen, and have been stressing in all our diplomatic engagements around this issue, that there should be transparency, there should be a fair and just process,” Morrison told reporters at an event in Queensland.

Yang was formally arrested in August last year on espionage allegations, and Chinese authorities earlier said he was being investigated for “criminal activities endangering national security.” He previously worked as a Chinese foreign affairs official in Beijing, the Australian newspaper reported in 2019.

Relations between Australia and its biggest trading partner have deteriorated sharply over a series of diplomatic issues, including Canberra’s decision to bar Huawei Technologies Co. from a rollout of a 5G network and the country’s support for an international inquiry into the origins of Covid-19. China has imposed limits on citizens traveling and studying in Australia, and has targeted commodity imports such as beef, wine and barley.

Cheng Lei, an Australian citizen employed by China’s English-language state broadcaster CGTN, was detained in August and authorities said last month she was being held over suspected state security violations.

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