| The rejection by the Beijing Higher People's
Court of journalist Ching Cheong's appeal
against his conviction for spying is not just a
blow to his family. It is also a shock to those
who want to see China's judicial system make
real progress in upholding the rule of law.
A brief report by Xinhua yesterday said the
high court held that the lower court's judgment
on Ching had not erred in law or fact. The
ruling was delivered after an appeal process in
which the high court considered submissions from
Ching, who was chief China correspondent for The
Straits Times in Singapore. No open hearing was
conducted.
The outcome of the appeal was as
disappointing and unconvincing as the lower
court's verdict. That judgment was never
formally released, on the grounds it contains
state secrets. But a copy has been circulating
on the internet and legal experts believe it to
be authentic. Their views are that its reasoning
is flawed.
According to the judgment, Ching started
contributing articles to Taiwan's Foundation on
International and Cross-Strait Studies in 2000
and received HK$300,000 in research fees. Ching
also asked mainland academic Lu Jianhua to
contribute articles to The Straits Times on
topics such as the Sino-US relationship,
Sino-Russian relations, the situation across the
Taiwan Strait, the anti-terrorism campaign and
the nuclear crisis in North Korea. Ching had,
since May 2004, passed to the foundation four
documents provided by Lu, which were classified
as top state secrets, and two more involving
intelligence, the court found.
Ching's defence was that he did not know the
foundation was a spy agency, nor that two chiefs
of the foundation were spies. He argued that
even if what he did led to an offence being
committed, his action only constituted
unintentional leakage of state secrets, not
spying. Regarding Lu, Ching's defence was that
he had not asked other people to write any
articles leaking state secrets.
Ching did no more than what journalists in
Hong Kong and elsewhere are sometimes invited to
do - contribute his brain power to a think-tank
and get paid for it. Yet he was convicted of
spying on the basis of affirmations by the
National Security Bureau and other authorities
that information in the articles involved what
they considered to be state secrets and that the
foundation was considered a spy organisation.
Had Ching been tried in other jurisdictions
with due regard for the presumption of
innocence, he would certainly have been
acquitted. For while he may have passed on
articles containing what were considered state
secrets to an alleged spy organisation, he did
it innocently. He could not have known the true
nature of the foundation. The court's uncritical
acceptance of the security bureau's
affirmations, and failure to allow the defence
to challenge its claims, also made a mockery of
mainland courts' claims to judicial
independence.
The outcome of Ching's case is a sad reminder
that the nature of the mainland government has
not changed despite its professed liberalism and
China's rising economic and political power. The
regime remains deeply paranoid about its hold on
power being undermined by allegedly subversive
elements. Regrettably, in its bid to protect the
country, the security apparatus has punished a
journalist with an impeccable record as a
patriot.
State leaders should know that the emergence
of China is the biggest news story in the world.
Reporting and analysing this story is a
much-coveted assignment for journalists. What
the country thinks of itself and the outside
world are items of legitimate interest to those
who care about the nation's development. But the
secretive nature of mainland society makes the
job of telling the China story to the world a
difficult undertaking. Ching's unrivalled
knowledge of the nation makes him one of the
journalists best suited to the task. By jailing
him, the nation has lost one of its best
advocates, and sent shivers down the spines of
those who tried to emulate him.
Copyright (c) 2000. South China Morning Post
Publishers Ltd. All rights reserved.
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