纽约时报中文网 - 英文原版-英China Acknowledges Imprisoning a British Man on Spy Charges
January 29, 2024 2 min 247 words
这则报道揭示了中英之间敏感而复杂的情报角力。中国承认以间谍罪名关押英国公民，凸显了两国关系中的紧张和不信任。这举动可能对外交关系造成严重冲击，尤其是在国际社会对人权和法治的高度关注下。这也反映出中国政府在处理境外涉及安全领域的问题时，采取强硬立场的趋势。然而，报道未提供足够信息来评估这位英国人是否真的涉及间谍活动，令人质疑中方的指控是否政治动机。此事件凸显了国际社会需要更透明和公正的法律程序，以确保每个被指控的人都能够公正辩护并受到公正对待。
A British businessman who disappeared from public view in China in 2018 was sentenced to five years in prison in 2022, China’s Foreign Ministry said on Friday, in its first public acknowledgment of the case.
The businessman, Ian J. Stones, had lived in China since the 1970s, working for companies like General Motors and Pfizer. For years after he vanished, there was no public information about his whereabouts, though some in the business community privately discussed his secret detention.
A spokesman for the Foreign Ministry said that Mr. Stones had been convicted in 2022 of “buying and unlawfully supplying intelligence for an organization or individual outside China.” Mr. Stones’s appeal of the verdict was rejected in September 2023, said the spokesman, Wang Wenbin.
Mr. Wang was responding to reporters’ questions at a regularly scheduled news conference, after The Wall Street Journal reported Mr. Stones’s case on Thursday.
“The Chinese courts heard the trial strictly in accordance with the law,” Mr. Wang said, adding that China “protects the lawful rights of Chinese and foreign parties.”
It is unclear when Mr. Stones will be released and whether he will be given credit for time served before his conviction.
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