'Spy’ reporter held under house arrest

HONG KONG - A detained Hong Kong reporter whom China accuses of espionage is being held under house arrest in Beijing, his wife said.

Mary Lau said yesterday that she was informed of Ching Cheong's whereabouts in documents given to her by an official from Hong Kong's Security Bureau on Friday night.

Lau gave no other information in a terse statement released via the Hong Kong Journalists' Association.

Ching, who is the chief China correspondent of Singapore's Straits Times newspaper, was detained by Chinese security agents in the southern city of Guangzhou on April 22.

China has accused Ching of spying for foreign intelligence agencies.

Lau said last week that her husband had worked with an academic at a Chinese Government think-tank who is now being held on suspicion of leaking state secrets, but was adamant that her husband had done nothing wrong.

If charged and convicted, Ching, 55, could face the death penalty.

Chinese legal experts said the reporter could languish in custody, perhaps for many months, after his formal arrest before he is tried.

The trial will almost certainly be held behind closed doors, and family members are often barred from visiting defendants until after they are convicted and sentenced.

Beijing appears to be tightening the reins on the media. It has levelled a fraud accusation against a Chinese researcher for the New York Times arrested last year on a charge of leaking state secrets to foreigners.

- REUTERS