China sentences 78-year-old American citizen to life in prison for espionage
John Shing-Wan Leung, a U.S. citizen and Hong Kong permanent resident, was a member of at least two CCP United Front organizations. But now he faces life behind bars in China on charges of espionage.
China sentenced a 78-year-old U.S. citizen to life in prison today on espionage charges in a case that will likely heighten concerns on Beijing’s growing scrutiny on foreign people and entities operating in China.
John Shing-Wan Leung (梁成运 Liáng Chéngyùn), a Hong Kong permanent resident who holds a U.S. passport, was convicted on spying charges and stripped of his political rights for life by the Intermediate People’s Court in the eastern city of Suzhou. Authorities also seized 500,000 yuan ($72,000) of his personal property, according to the court’s official statement posted on WeChat.
Leung was detained on suspicions of “engaging in espionage” by local security services on April 15, 2021. No further details about his trial or the charges lodged against him were listed.
Closed-door trials for national security cases are common in China. Authorities rarely disclose much information on such sensitive cases, particularly ones that include charges of sedition or espionage.
However, Leung’s heavy life sentence as a U.S. citizen is likely to stoke already-growing concerns over the shrinking space for foreign people and businesses operating in China. On July 1, Beijing’s new revisions that broaden the scope of the country’s anti-espionage law will come into effect, a move that will bring those working in sensitive industries, such as journalism, technology, research, and data monitoring, under greater scrutiny.
A U.S. embassy spokesperson said in an emailed statement to Reuters “that it was aware of the case, but due to privacy considerations had no further comment.”
Leung is or was the chairman of the Texas branches of the China Association for the Promotion of Peaceful Reunification and the U.S.-China Friendship Promotion Association, both of which are connected to the United Front, the Chinese Communist Party’s influence network of non-Party organizations and individuals.
Beijing’s growing security paranoia
Since coming to power in 2012, Chinese President Xí Jìnpíng 习近平 has made national security a driving force of his administration. While the existing anti-espionage law was already a powerful legal tool, the new revisions will rapidly expand on what falls under national security.
The news comes as a number of people have been arrested or detained by Chinese authorities in the past few months. In March, police arrested a Japanese executive from Astellas Pharma on espionage charges. In April, the family of Dǒng Yùyù 董郁玉, an editor for the Communist Party newspaper the Guangming Daily, told media he had been in detention for more than a year on espionage charges after having lunch with a Japanese diplomat in 2022.
Also in April, employees at Bain, the U.S. management consulting firm, were questioned by police during a surprise visit to the company’s Shanghai office. While nobody was detained, their computers and phones were confiscated. A similar incident occurred in March in the Beijing offices of American due diligence firm the Mintz Group, where five Chinese nationals were detained by authorities, who later shut down the branch.
Meanwhile, international advisory firm Capvision, which is a Chinese company based in Shanghai and provides information to many corporate clients in and outside of China, was investigated by state security forces in Suzhou last week.
