China restarts case against `New York Times' researcher

The lawyer for jailed China-based New York Times researcher Zhao Yan (趙岩) said yesterday the state had announced its intention to resume prosecution procedures only weeks after dropping the case.

"The prosecution office told me today that they have decided to resume the investigation and prosecution of Zhao Yan," lawyer Mo Shaoping (莫少平) said.

"There are no such regulations in China's criminal law on `resuming investigation and prosecution.' This is illegal, they have no right to continue to detain Zhao Yan," Mo said.

Zhao's disappearance into police custody in September 2004 caused a diplomatic storm between Washington and Beijing.

Many had expected he would be released before Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) arrives in the US today.

The resumption of the case comes after Beijing's Number Two People's Procuratorate, the prosecuting body, told Mo on March 17 that charges against Zhao of leaking state secrets had been dropped.

Zhao was charged on Oct. 20, 2004, with "divulging state secrets," a charge that carries the maximum penalty of death.

He was detained days after the New York Times reported that former Chinese president Jiang Zemin (江澤民) would resign from his top military post at a secretive high-level meeting of the Chinese Communist Party.

At the time of the report, Jiang's plan to retire was a closely guarded secret.