Australia has granted a protection visa to a former Chinese policeman who claims to have information on the torture and abuse of dissidents in China, his lawyer said yesterday.
Hao Fengjun (郝鳳軍), 32, received the visa last week, a day after testifying at a Senate inquiry into the government's handling of another high-profile Chinese defector, lawyer Bernard Collaery said.
Hao claims to have worked for a Chinese security department known as the 610 Office, where his job was to handle reports from overseas informants spying on pro-democracy activists and followers of the Falun Gong meditation movement. He arrived in Australia in February as a tourist and subsequently sought asylum, saying he had brought secret documents detailing the torture and abuse by Chinese authorities of Falun Gong practitioners. His case became public after a first secretary at China's consulate in Sydney, Chen Yonglin (陳用林), quit his post and demanded political asylum in May, asserting that China had up to 1,000 spies operating in Australia.
PHOTO: EPA
After initially refusing the request, the government granted Chen, 37, a protection visa early last month. Both Hao and Chen testified last week to a Senate committee looking into the government's handling of Chen's initial asylum request. Collaery told the same inquiry that immigration officials ignored Hao for months and only interviewed the former policeman early last month after he went public with his claims about abuse of Falun Gong members.
Yesterday, Collaery suggested his client finally received a protection visa allowing him to remain in Australia only because of the publicity surrounding last week's Senate hearings.
"It took that kind of pressure ... to get protection in our country," he was quoted as saying by the Australian Associated Press.
Collaery spoke as Hao attended a protest by about 80 Falun Gong followers near a Canberra court that was hearing a complaint by the movement against Foreign Minister Alexander Downer.
Their suit claims Downer's department unfairly curbs freedom of expression by imposing restrictions on protest demonstrations outside the Chinese embassy in Canberra.
China on Monday announced its first ever sanctions against an individual Japanese lawmaker, targeting China-born Hei Seki for “spreading fallacies” on issues such as Taiwan, Hong Kong and disputed islands, prompting a protest from Tokyo. Beijing has an ongoing spat with Tokyo over islands in the East China Sea claimed by both countries, and considers foreign criticism on sensitive political topics to be acts of interference. Seki, a naturalised Japanese citizen, “spread false information, colluded with Japanese anti-China forces, and wantonly attacked and smeared China”, foreign ministry spokesman Lin Jian told reporters on Monday. “For his own selfish interests, (Seki)
VENEZUELAN ACTION: Marco Rubio said that previous US interdiction efforts have not stemmed the flow of illicit drugs into the US and that ‘blowing them up’ would US President Donald Trump on Wednesday justified a lethal military strike that his administration said was carried out a day earlier against a Venezuelan gang as a necessary effort by the US to send a message to Latin American cartels. Asked why the military did not instead interdict the vessel and capture those on board, Trump said that the operation would cause drug smugglers to think twice about trying to move drugs into the US. “There was massive amounts of drugs coming into our country to kill a lot of people and everybody fully understands that,” Trump said while hosting Polish President
Japan yesterday heralded the coming-of-age of Japanese Prince Hisahito with an elaborate ceremony at the Imperial Palace, where a succession crisis is brewing. The nephew of Japanese Emperor Naruhito, Hisahito received a black silk-and-lacquer crown at the ceremony, which marks the beginning of his royal adult life. “Thank you very much for bestowing the crown today at the coming-of-age ceremony,” Hisahito said. “I will fulfill my duties, being aware of my responsibilities as an adult member of the imperial family.” Although the emperor has a daughter — Princess Aiko — the 23-year-old has been sidelined by the royal family’s male-only
A French couple kept Louise, a playful black panther, in an apartment in northern France, triggering panic when she was spotted roaming nearby rooftops. The pair were were handed suspended jail sentences on Thursday for illegally keeping a wild animal, despite protesting that they saw Louise as their baby. The ruling follows a September 2019 incident when the months-old feline was seen roaming a rooftop in Armentieres after slipping out of the couple’s window. Authorities captured the panther by sedating her with anesthetic darts after she entered a home. No injuries were reported during the animal’s time on the loose. The court in the
RSS