China will put an Australian television anchor on trial over state secret charges that carry a maximum sentence of life in jail, escalating a case that has contributed to tensions between Beijing and Canberra.
Australia’s foreign ministry said it has been notified by Chinese authorities that Cheng Lei will face trial on March 31, according to a statement on Saturday.
Cheng, a Chinese-born Australian who most recently worked for state broadcaster CGTN, will appear at the Beijing No 2 People’s Intermediate Court at 9am on Thursday after 19 months of detention, Australia’s ABC News reported on Friday. Australian diplomats are not expected to be able to attend the trial, the news outlet reported.
“The Australian Government has regularly raised serious concerns about Ms Cheng’s welfare and conditions of detention,” according to the foreign ministry statement. “We expect basic standards of justice, procedural fairness and humane treatment to be met, in accordance with international norms.”
Australia said it has asked that its officials be permitted to attend Cheng’s hearing, “in line with China’s obligations under the Australia-China bilateral consular agreement,” according to the foreign ministry statement. Its officials have regularly visited her, most recently on March 21, it added.
Cheng was formally arrested in China on Feb 5, 2021, after six months of detention, and was initially denied access to lawyers. China said in September 2020 that Cheng was “suspected of carrying out criminal activities endangering China’s national security,” among the most serious allegations ever brought against a foreign journalist based in the country.
China’s foreign ministry later said that judicial authorities had concluded Cheng “conducted illegal activities on supplying state secrets overseas” and approved her arrest.
Australian embassy officials have raised “serious concerns” about her case at senior levels, Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne said last year. Cheng’s children, age 10 and 12, are living with family members in Melbourne.
Cheng’s case came to light amid deteriorating relations between China and Australia, sparking fears Beijing had targeted Cheng to exert pressure on Canberra. Tensions were high after Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s government called for an independent probe into the origins of the coronavirus, a move seen in China as backing former United States President Donald Trump’s efforts to blame it for the Covid-19 pandemic.
Last year, two Canadians, Michael Spavor and Michael Kovrig, were released from China after being detained for more than 1,000 days on spying charges. Their release came hours after a top Huawei Technologies Co executive was released from extradition proceedings in Canada, but Beijing and the White House denied the two cases were connected.
Haze Fan, a member of Bloomberg News’s Beijing bureau, was detained by the Beijing National Security Bureau in December 2020, with authorities saying at the time that she was suspected of national security law violations. She has not been seen since then.