Glutter

Awaiting a Democratic Hong Kong

Dear Mr. Ching Cheong.

You are still in jail this New Year. I heard them talk about you on the radio today. It's my first day back to Hong Kong after three months, a quarter of a year away. It's easy to forget about the struggles we as a country have to go through, and the freedoms we still need when I am away. When you are in America, you don't think about how people go to jail for trying to tell the truth. You hear people talk about the lack of free speech in their country, and I think "they don't really know." You hear about how China will take over the world and be the next super power. You hear people talk about the Olympics. You hear about the great achievements of the last decade, the economic freedoms, the fact China is "Playing good." Sometimes I remember to tell them they are not. I tell them about you. I tell them that you are accused of spying because you wanted to find the last interview of Zhao ZiYang and how he reportedly said that the only future for China is democracy. I tell them that my government is not playing nice.

I tell them that I am leaving China to get my foreign passport so I know I will be safe and that my future children will be safe. I tell them that my name is banned in Google and Yahoo! And I tell them that I worry that one day the future of Hong Kong would mean they don't have to trick journalists like you to go across the mainland and be arrested. They can do it over here as well.

I try to tell them in face of the nothingness of foreign media -about the people who disappear, those whose name we don't know and all the activists they have put under house arrest as a run up to the Olympics. I tell them about you.

We are thinking of you in Hong Kong. People are talking about you on the radio. We remember you are still in jail and your family cannot visit you. We are still hoping, talking and thinking about it all.

We still want to see a democratic Hong Kong without sacrifices of people like you.

I won't be here long. I will be leaving soon, but I am glad to be home for a while to remember.

Yours Sincerely, Yan

CHINA: Reunion dinner visit ruled out for jailed ST journalist and wife

Ching Cheong's wife may have to wait until at least next month to see him

Straits Times
Wednesday, February 14, 2007

By Vince Chong

The Guangzhou prison authorities have refused to arrange a reunion dinner visit for jailed Hong Kong journalist Ching Cheong's wife.

They told her that she would have to wait until next month at the earliest to see him.

The Straits Times' chief China correspondent and his wife, Ms Mary Lau, have not seen each other since he was detained by mainland security officials in southern China in April 2005.

Ms Lau, who lives in Hong Kong, had applied to the prison authorities to have the traditional meal with her husband before Chinese New Year on Feb 18.

"I am disappointed, but it was not entirely unexpected," she told The Straits Times yesterday.

Now serving a five-year jail sentence for espionage, Ching, 57, was transferred to Guangzhou Prison from Beijing on Jan 31 following his family's appeals for the move.

On Monday, during one of her daily calls to the prison authorities, Ms Lau was told that Ching had to first take part in a one-month course of "si xiang jiao yu" -- or "political education" -- before being allowed any visits.

"They asked me to reapply to see him in March," she said.

"I will do that and will continue to write in to (Hong Kong Chief Executive) Donald Tsang to ask for help in getting medical parole for Ching."

Ching suffers ailments ranging from high blood pressure and insomnia to stomach pains.

China's prison regulations allow visits by family members once a month.

Ching was sentenced last August for spying for Taiwan, with his jail term backdated by 12 months to the date when he was officially charged.

He lost his appeal last November.

About a month later, he was transferred to Beijing's Tianhe Prison -- a transit labour camp -- after having spent more than 20 months in detention.