A London-based rights group said yesterday that China was preparing to execute a Chinese businessman convicted of spying for Taiwan, and urged Beijing to halt the execution.
Amnesty International urged China not to execute businessman and medical scientist Wo Weihan, who was sentenced to death in May last year for spying for Taiwan, the group said in a statement.
Wo was found “guilty of discussing the health status of senior Chinese leaders, which is considered to be top secret, and of sending information from a classified magazine available in the Chinese Academy of Sciences library,” it said.
After refusing visitation rights for nearly four years, the Beijing High Court on Tuesday told Wo’s family to apply for a visit within seven days, the statement said.
“This sudden move suggests that ... the Beijing Municipal Higher People’s Court is preparing to execute Wo Weihan,” it said.
Calls to the High Court went unanswered yesterday.
In April, Austrian President Heinz Fischer appealed to Beijing to spare Wo, who formerly lived in Austria.
Amnesty said Wo was detained in Beijing in 2005, and according to the court verdict he confessed to the charges while in detention.
But his family said the confession was made in the absence of a lawyer and that he later recanted his confession, it said.
Amnesty “expresses concern that Wo Weihan may not have received a fair trial according to international standards, particularly as he was not allowed prompt access to a lawyer,” the statement said.
An apartment building in New Taipei City’s Sanchong District (三重) collapsed last night after a nearby construction project earlier in the day allegedly caused it to tilt. Shortly after work began at 9am on an ongoing excavation of a construction site on Liuzhang Street (六張街), two neighboring apartment buildings tilted and cracked, leading to exterior tiles peeling off, city officials said. The fire department then dispatched personnel to help evacuate 22 residents from nine households. After the incident, the city government first filled the building at No. 190, which appeared to be more badly affected, with water to stabilize the
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