Detention linked to U.S.-China standoff

Gao Zhan has been held in China since February 11

In this story: U.S. deny link Political and legal pressure RELATED STORIES, SITES

HONG KONG, China (CNN) -- A Chinese-born U.S. academic detained in China could have her freedom jeopardised by the current impasse between the two countries.

According to the husband of detained Gao Zhan, his wife's freedom could be used as a bargaining chip in the spat between the U.S. and China over the collision of a spy plane and fighter jet from the respective countries.

Espionage charges were filed against Gao last Sunday after a U.S. Navy reconnaissance plane made an emergency landing in China and the Chinese fighter plane crashed into the South China Sea.

IN-DEPTH China - U.S.: Collision in the sky

Gao has been detained in China for almost two months.

Asked about the surveillance plane's impact on his wife's detention, Xue Donghua told CNN on Thursday, "It looks like the Chinese side, they put my wife's case under the shadow of this U.S.-China relation ... I don't want my wife to be a victim of this troubled U.S.-China relationship."

AUDIO Xue Donghua says he doesn't want his wife to be a victim of the standoff 366 KB/0:33sec AIFF or WAV sound

Xue denied his wife had anything to do with espionage, saying the charges against Gao are linked to the plane mishap, he said.

"I really don't think this is a coincidence," he said. "I think they used my wife as a victim."

U.S. deny link

But White House Spokesman Ari Fleischer said Thursday there appeared to be no link between the two cases.

"The Chinese government arrested Gao Zhan several weeks ago, and we do not see a tie between the two events. Obviously, it predated the accident, so there can be no tie."

Asked about the timing of the charges, he said, "It's the judgment of the United States government and the president that there is no tie."

Asked whether the government believed the Chinese government's charges, Fleischer did not respond.

Xue has not heard from his wife, and neither U.S. embassy nor Red Cross officials have been allowed to visit her since she was detained February 11.

In an effort to pressure the Chinese, Republican Sen. George Allen, said Thursday he will introduce a bill to grant immediate citizenship to Gao.

Allen said he hoped the bill might speed the release of the expert in Taiwan-mainland China relations. U.S. citizens are allowed consular visits.

Gao, her husband and their five-year-old son were taken into custody at Beijing International Airport 53 days ago as they prepared to return to the United States after three weeks in China.

Political and legal pressure

Gao's husband and son, who have had no contact with her since they were taken from the airport by plainclothes police in separate cars, were released after 26 days of detention.

Gao is a Ph.D. researcher at American University in Washington.

Xue's attorney, Jerome Cohen, told CNN he was working to mobilize "all kinds of pressures, legal pressures and of course political pressures" on the Chinese government.

Cohen said the Chinese are guilty of "a number of obvious illegalities," including holding the family longer than allowed before contacting U.S. authorities.

"I think it's time for the Chinese government to apologize for violating its own laws in dealing with Dr. Gao," he said, and ridiculed Chinese claims that they had not known the boy was a U.S. citizen. The boy was carrying a U.S. passport at the time he was detained, Cohen said.

The lawyer said the burden of proof is on the Chinese to back up their charge of espionage. "They've produced not one fact in support of it," he said.

Cohen called the detention "an attempt to intimidate the American academic community, and especially people of Chinese descent, who have the greatest knowledge of China and the greatest contact with China."

The Chinese especially want to discourage contact between people from the mainland and Taiwan, he said.

China formally arrests scholar
April 4, 2001
Diplomatic row between U.S and China continues
April 6, 2001
Scholar's husabnad denies charges
March 28, 2001

Human rights in China
The Supreme People's Procuratorate of China

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