“Based on our understanding, Phan-Gillis, because of suspected espionage, has been charged according to law by the relevant Chinese department”, Hua Chunying, a spokeswoman for China’s Foreign Ministry, said in a news conference Tuesday.
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Houston businesswoman Sandy Phan-Gillis has been detained in the country by the Ministry of State Security – which oversees espionage and counterespionage – without proper cause, a move that has been criticized by the worldwide community.
A court in southern China says prosecutors have indicted an American woman on charges of spying. “The relevant Chinese department will handle the case strictly according to law”, she said, without elaborating.
The U.N. Working Group on Arbitrary Detention criticized the detention of Phan-Gillis early last month.
The US State Department has urged China to resolve the case “expeditiously”.
Jeff Gillis has said China claims she acted as a spy for a foreign government in 1996. He said the charges did not indicate the government she allegedly spied for.
In a letter dictated to a usa consular official and released by her husband, Jeff Gillis, Phan-Gillis said the charges against her were political.
If Phan-Gillis is convicted, she is likely to be sentenced to more than 10 years in prison. A Chinese man named Su Bin was jailed for a total of 46 months after he plead guilty to conspiring to steal sensitive military information by hacking into the networks of major US defense contractors.
She was detained in China in March 2015 as she passed through a Macao-China immigration checkpoint, while on a trade mission that included a Houston city councilman. In July, a Chinese man, Su Bin, 51, was sent to prison for 46 months in the United States after pleading guilty to conspiring to hack into the computer networks of major USA defense contractors.
Su Bin, 51, was jailed for 46 months in July after pleading guilty to conspiring to hack into the computer networks of major US defence contractors.
Obama is scheduled to hold bilateral meetings with Chinese President Xi Jinping on Saturday. The State Department has informed every level of the Chinese government that Phan-Gillis is not a spy, and consular officers have been checking on her condition.
China’s state secret law is extremely broad, encompassing everything from industrial data to top leaders’ birthdays.
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There is no independent oversight of China’s law enforcement authorities or courts, which answer to the ruling Communist Party.
