By GB News (Politics) | Created at 2024-11-27 19:26:12 | Updated at 2024-11-27 21:47:12
2 hours ago
Chinese authorities have released three US citizens who Washington said were wrongfully detained in China.
Mark Swidan, Kai Li and John Leung were released after intensive talks between White House and State Department officials and their Chinese counterparts.
The National Security Council said in a statement the three men's release meant all Americans they deem wrongfully detained in China had now been released.
A spokesman from the NSC said: "Soon they will return and be reunited with their families for the first time in many years."
President Biden and Xi
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President Joe Biden meets with China's President Xi Jinping
Reuters
Back in September, China freed US pastor David Lin, who had been in jail since 2006 and was also considered wrongfully detained. US officials declined to confirm reports at the time that a Chinese national was released in exchange for Lin.
Biden, whose four-year term ends on January 20, has secured the release of more than 70 Americans detained overseas, in some cases swapped them for prisoners in the United States.
In 2022, China was one of six countries the State Department slapped with a "D" warning to its travel advisory to indicate the risk of US citizens being detained and used as bargaining chips.
Officials in Beijing may be hoping that their release will pave the way for the State Department to downgrade its current travel warning for China that advises Americans to "reconsider travel" to the country. China sees the advisory as an obstacle to restoring business and tourist travel to pre-pandemic levels.
BA has previously described London to Beijing as one of its 'most important routes'
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US advice to travelers to mainland China changed from Level Three, "reconsider travel," to Level Two, "exercise increased caution."
However, the advisory still warned that US citizens in China "may be subjected to interrogations and detention without fair and transparent treatment under the law."
John Kamm, founder of the Dui Hua Foundation, told Politico: "There are a lot of things that China could do to improve US-China relations, but most of them they’re unwilling to do...but China has many [American] prisoners who are unjustly detained … [and] it’s a relatively easy thing to release some of them."
