Following the meeting between U.S. President Joe Biden and Chinese leader Xi Jinping in San Francisco on Wednesday, analysts say Beijing is hoping to de-escalate tension with the U.S. by easing its stance and projecting a less confrontational tone.

“In the official readout, Xi states China has no plan to surpass or supplant America and he also notes that China doesn’t export its ideology, showing a markedly narrower scope of geopolitical ambition,” Wen-ti Sung, a political scientist at the Australian National University (ANU), told VOA in a written response.  

He said the messages are in stark contrast to Xi’s previous proclamation that “the East is rising and the West is falling.”

In the official readout released on Thursday, Xi highlighted the importance for Beijing and Washington to avoid confrontation, saying that “turning their back on each other” is not an option for the two superpowers.

“Major-country competition can’t solve the problems facing China and the United States or the world,” he said. “The world is big enough to accommodate both countries and one country’s success is an opportunity for the other.”

Apart from emphasizing the need to avoid conflict, Xi said China has no plan to “surpass or unseat the United States” and that it doesn’t export its ideology.

He laid out five principles for Beijing and Washington to manage bilateral relations, calling on both sides to develop a “right perception,” jointly manage disagreements, advance mutually beneficial cooperation, shoulder responsibilities as major countries, and promote people-to-people ties.

“It is important that they appreciate each other’s principles and red lines and have more communications, more dialogues, more consultations and calmly handle their differences as well as accidents,” Xi said.

Some experts say the points highlighted in the readout and other efforts from Beijing before the meeting all suggest the Chinese government’s desire to frame the meeting between Biden and Xi as a success. “I think the overall response [from Beijing] was firm but positive,” Amanda Hsiao, senior China analyst at International Crisis Group, told VOA by phone.

In her view, the Chinese government wants to project the image that it remains in control of the bilateral relationship but it’s also opening up to the U.S. “[Beijing wants to show] that it is extending a gesture out to the U.S. to improve relations but it’s doing so from a position of strength,” she said.

While some analysts view Beijing’s messages from the readout as largely conciliatory and positive, others say it still reflects China’s reservation about Washington’s possible attempt to influence its governance system.

“The mention of not changing each other’s systems suggests China’s suspicion that the United States is out to alter its communist party-dominated system,” Ian Chong, a political scientist at National Singapore University, told VOA in a written response.

Xi emphasizes ‘common interests’

Apart from emphasizing the importance of preventing competition from escalating into conflict, Xi also highlighted the need for China and the U.S. to expand cooperation in a wide range of areas, including economy, trade, agriculture, climate change, and artificial intelligence.  

“The common interests between China and the United States have increased, not decreased,” he said, according to the readout.

Despite his emphasis on broadening the scope of bilateral cooperation, Xi also urged the U.S. to end export controls and the practice of investment screening, referring to a government executive order that restricts U.S. investments into Chinese companies or Chinese-owned companies engaged in three advanced technology areas.   

“Stifling China’s technological progress is nothing but a move to contain China’s high-quality development and deprive the Chinese people of their right to development,” Xi said, adding that China’s development and growth “won’t be stopped by external forces.”

Sung from ANU said these messages show that Washington’s controls risking may be generating enough pressure on China to force Beijing to “pivot back to a more conciliatory posture.”  

“China’s economic woes seem to be catching up with its foreign policy rhetoric,” he told VOA.

As part of the effort to encourage foreign investment in China, Xi told a group of U.S. business leaders that China would be a “friend and partner” of the U.S. while reiterating that Beijing “never bet on the United States to lose.”  

“The world needs China and the U.S. to work together for a better future,” he told an audience of business leaders, including Apple CEO Tim Cook and Tesla CEO Elon Musk. “China is ready to be a partner and friend of the U.S.”

Given the economic slowdown that China has experienced since the start of 2023, Chong in Singapore said Xi would like to encourage foreign investment and technological exchanges, as it “could help foster growth” in the Chinese economy.

Attempt to reduce tension over Taiwan

Despite the ongoing tension between China and the U.S. over Taiwan, Xi still briefly addressed the topic during his meeting with Biden. According to the readout, he urged the U.S. to “take real actions” to honor its commitment of “not supporting Taiwan independence, stop arming Taiwan and support China’s reunification.”  

“China will realize reunification, and this is unstoppable,” he said.

Compared to previous statements on Taiwan, Hsiao from the International Crisis Group said Xi’s remarks on Wednesday were relatively brief. “In the past, you would see a long elaboration of China’s position on Taiwan, but this tone is different,” she told VOA.

In her view, the latest statement from Beijing is more specific about what China is asking of the U.S. when it comes to Taiwan. “I think what we have seen from this readout, as well as from the U.S. side, indicate that the two sides are seeking to de-escalate around Taiwan, particularly because there are elections coming up, which could create unknowns in the relationship and could potentially see tensions flare up,” Hsiao said.

While the messages from China seem more positive and conciliatory, Hsiao said the essence of U.S.-China relations hasn’t changed.  

“It remains a competitive relationship and even if China continues to say that it believes it’s not a competitive relationship, it will continue to see Washington as a key rival in reality,” she told VOA.

She thinks the biggest achievement of the Biden-Xi meeting is to create some protection against some key events that will take place in the next year, including presidential elections in Taiwan and the U.S.  

“It’s important that this meeting occurred so we have that buffer going into the year where things might get commensurate,” Hsiao said.
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A controversial section of federal law that gives U.S. intelligence agencies the ability to conduct warrantless surveillance of the communications of non-U.S. persons abroad will expire at the end of the year, creating pressure on Congress to renew it, even as privacy activists demand that it be reformed.  

Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) allows electronic surveillance of non-U.S. persons overseas and outside the United States for purposes of national security. It also contains a provision allowing for surveillance of foreign intelligence targets within the U.S., subject to the approval of a special Foreign Intelligence Surveillance court.    

Because the surveillance of foreign nationals can often pick up the communications of American citizens who are not its direct target, many civil liberties organizations believe FISA operations violate legal protections on individual privacy. Adding to that concern is the fact that the information collected as part of FISA surveillance can be queried by domestic law enforcement agencies, such as the Federal Bureau of Investigation, without a warrant. Critics say this practice amounts to “backdoor searches.”  

Investigations in recent years have found numerous instances in which law enforcement agencies have abused the FISA process to obtain access to information about U.S. nationals. That includes operations that gathered information about former President Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign team and others that targeted the leaders of the Black Lives Matter movement.  

Rights groups object  

Jeramie D. Scott, senior counsel and director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center’s (EPIC) Project on Surveillance Oversight, told VOA that his group believes the law should only be renewed if major safeguards are added.  

“EPIC and our coalition partners have been very clear that Section 702 should not be reauthorized without significant reforms, including a warrant requirement for searches of U.S. persons’ information,” he wrote in an email exchange.  

Kia Hamadanchy, a senior policy counsel with the American Civil Liberties Union, said that his organization has been challenging Section 702 since the day FISA was signed into law, and that its opposition continues.    

“We have serious, serious concerns with how the problem is being operated,” he told VOA. “Over the last 15 years, we’ve seen a whole host of abuses. … So, our current position is that Section 702 should not be reauthorized absent fundamental reform.”    

Law enforcement cites need  

In an appearance before the House Committee on Homeland Security on Wednesday, FBI Director Christopher Wray delivered prepared testimony in which he outlined a broad range of security threats facing the country, and said that allowing Section 702 to expire, or restricting its use, would make the country less safe.  

“Loss of this vital provision, or its reauthorization in a narrowed form, would raise profound risks,” Wray said. “For the FBI in particular, either outcome could mean substantially impairing, or in some cases entirely eliminating, our ability to find and disrupt many of the most serious security threats.”  

At the same hearing, Christine Abizaid, director of the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC), described Section 702 as essential to protecting the country against terrorist attacks.  

“One of the most important questions for NCTC to determine is whether international terrorists could gain access to and pose a threat to the Homeland,” Abizaid said in her prepared testimony. “Section 702 is essential for our ability to do that, and without it, the United States and the world will be less safe.”  

Different tracks in Congress  

There appear to be at least two competing Section 702 reauthorization proposals making their way through Congress.  

Last week, a bipartisan group of lawmakers from both the House of Representatives and the Senate announced the introduction of the Government Surveillance Reform Act, which would reauthorize Section 702 with significant restrictions.  

Among other things, the bill would require domestic law enforcement agencies to obtain a warrant before searching FISA data for information about American citizens. It has been endorsed by a large number of civil liberties organizations. 

“Americans know that it is possible to confront our country’s adversaries ferociously without throwing our constitutional rights in the trash can,” said Senator Ron Wyden, one of the co-sponsors, when the bill was introduced. “But for too long, surveillance laws have not kept up with changing times.” 

Narrower reform    

On Tuesday, the news organization Politico obtained a set of talking points outlining the shape of a competing Section 702 reauthorization proposal being considered by the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. The restrictions it would place on law enforcement use of Section 702 are fewer. For example, domestic law enforcement agencies would only need to obtain a warrant to search FISA data for “evidence of a crime.”  

Rights groups criticized the intelligence committee’s version of reform for not going far enough.  

“Limiting a warrant requirement to ‘evidence of a crime’ searches does little to address the well-documented abuses of the 702 authority,” said Scott of EPIC. “Furthermore, any serious proposal for reform needs to go beyond 702 to close similar loopholes that allow the government to obtain Americans’ information without a warrant. To not do so is to not take Americans’ privacy and civil liberties seriously.” 
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Police in the nation’s capital responded Wednesday night to a protest outside the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee calling for a cease-fire in the Israel-Hamas war.

U.S. Capitol Police said about 150 people were “illegally and violently protesting” near the DNC headquarters building in the Capitol Hill neighborhood of Washington. Members of Congress were evacuated from the building as the protest erupted.

Video posted on social media showed protesters shoving police officers and trying to grab hold of metal barricades as the officers moved in to make arrests. The videos also show officers shoving protesters. Many of the protesters were wearing black shirts that read “Cease Fire Now.”

Protesters included members of If Not Now and Jewish Voice for Peace, who have organized other demonstrations in Washington.

If Not Now posted on X, formerly known as Twitter, that “police are being extremely violent.”

“We are linking arms, threatening no one, and begging our politicians to support an end to the killing and the suffering in Gaza. Begging, peacefully, for a cease-fire,” the group posted.

The clashes Wednesday evening are the latest example of roiling tensions over the war between Israel and Hamas.

President Joe Biden has been under increasing pressure from the Democratic Party’s left flank over his support for Israel’s military operation, including interruptions from protesters at his speeches. He has resisted calls for a cease-fire, instead saying there should be pauses in the fighting to facilitate the delivery of humanitarian assistance and the potential extraction of hostages.

Last week, a large number of House Democrats joined nearly all Republicans in voting to censure Rep. Rashida Tlaib, the only Palestinian American in Congress, over her criticism of the Israeli government’s treatment of Palestinians.

Tlaib, who has family in the West Bank, came under heavy criticism after she failed to immediately condemn Hamas after the attack. She since has called out the terrorist group while also calling for a cease-fire.

The Metropolitan Police Department said its officers also responded to the disturbance. Officials sent an alert to congressional staffers telling them no one would be permitted to enter or exit any House office buildings.

Rep. Brad Sherman, a California Democrat, said he was evacuated from the building by police after protesters began “pepper-spraying police officers and attempting to break into the building.”
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It began as a familiar old story.

In the early 2000s, multinational mining giant Rio Tinto came to the wilds of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula to dig a nickel mine.

Environmentalists feared pollution. The company promised jobs.

The usual battle lines were drawn. The usual legal fights ensued.

But this time, something different happened.

The mining company invited a respected local environmental group to be an independent watchdog, conducting pollution testing that goes above and beyond what regulators require.

More than a decade has passed, and no major pollution problems have arisen. Community opposition has softened.

“I was fiercely opposed to the mine, and I changed,” said Maura Davenport, board chair of the Superior Watershed Partnership, the environmental group doing the testing.

The agreement between the mining company and the environmentalists is working at a time when demand for nickel and other metals used in green technologies is on the rise, but the mining activity that supplies those metals faces fierce local resistance around the world.

Historic mines, polluting history

The shift to cleaner energy needs copper to wire electrical grids, rare earth elements for wind turbine magnets, lithium for electric vehicle batteries, nickel to make those batteries run longer, and more. Meeting the goals of the 2015 U.N. Paris climate agreement would mean a fourfold increase in demand for metals overall by 2040 and a 19-fold increase in nickel, according to the International Energy Agency.

That means more mines. But mines rarely open anywhere in the world without controversy. Two nearby copper-nickel mine proposals hit major roadblocks this year over environmental concerns.

For the third year running, mining companies listed environmental, social and governance issues as the leading risk facing their businesses in a survey by consulting firm EY.

Mining is not new to the Upper Peninsula, the northern tip of the state of Michigan that is mostly surrounded by the Great Lakes. The region was the nation’s leading copper and iron producer until the late 1800s. An open-pit iron mine still operates about 20 kilometers (12 miles) southwest of the college town of Marquette.

Most of the historic copper mines closed in the 1930s. But the waste they left behind is still polluting today.

Residue left over from pulverizing copper ore, known as stamp sands, continues to drift into Lake Superior, leaching toxic levels of copper into the water.

“The whole history of mining is so bad, and we feared … for our precious land,” Davenport said.

The ore Rio Tinto sought is in a form known as nickel sulfide. When those rocks are exposed to air and water, they produce sulfuric acid. Acid mine drainage pollutes thousands of kilometers of water bodies across the United States. At its worst, it can render a stream nearly lifeless.

When Rio Tinto proposed building the Eagle Mine about 40 kilometers (25 miles) northwest of Marquette, “it divided our community,” Davenport said.

“The Marquette community was against the mine,” she said, but the “iron ore miners, they were all about it.”

Mining dilemma

It’s the same story the world over, according to Simon Nish, who worked for Rio Tinto at the time.

“Communities are faced with this dilemma,” Nish said. “We want jobs, we want economic benefit. We don’t want long-term environmental consequences. We don’t really trust the regulator. We don’t trust the company. We don’t trust the activists. … In the absence of trusted information, we’re probably going to say no.”

Nish came from Australia, where a legal reckoning had taken place in the 1990s over the land rights of the country’s indigenous peoples. Early in his career, he worked as a mediator for the National Native Title Tribunal, which brokered agreements between Aboriginal peoples and resource companies who wanted to use their land.

It was a formative experience.

“On the resource company side, you can crash through and get a short-term deal, but that’s actually not benefiting anybody,” he said. “If you want to get a long-term outcome, you’ve actually really got to understand the interests of both sides.”

“Absolutely skeptical”

When Nish arrived in Michigan in 2011, Rio Tinto’s Eagle Mine was under construction but faced multiple lawsuits from community opponents.

In order to quell the controversy, Nish knew that Rio Tinto needed a partner that the community could trust. So he approached the Superior Watershed Partnership with an unusual offer. The group was already running programs testing local waterways for pollution. Would they be willing to discuss running a program to monitor the mine?

“We were surprised. We were skeptical. Absolutely skeptical,” Davenport said. But they agreed to discuss it.

SWP insisted on full, unfettered access to monitor “anything, any time, anywhere,” Nish said.

SWP’s position toward Rio Tinto was “very, very clear,” he recalled: “‘We’ve spent a long time building our reputation, our credibility here. We aren’t going to burn it for you guys.'”

Over the course of several months — “remarkably fast,” as these things go, Nish said — the environmental group and the mining company managed to work out an agreement.

SWP would monitor the rivers, streams and groundwater for pollution from the mine and the ore-processing mill 30 kilometers (19 miles) south. It would test food and medicinal plants important for the local Native American tribe. And it would post the results of these and other tests online for the public to see.

And Rio Tinto would pay for the work. A respected local community foundation would handle the funds. Rio Tinto’s funding would be at arm’s length from SWP.

“We didn’t want to be on their payroll,” said Richard Anderson, who chaired the SWP board at the time. “That could not be part of the structure.”

Not over yet

The agreement launching the Community Environmental Monitoring Program was signed in 2012. More than a decade later, no major pollution problems have turned up.

But other local environmentalists are cautious.

“I do think [Eagle Mine is] really trying to do a good job environmentally,” said Rochelle Dale, head of the Yellow Dog Watershed Preserve, another local environmental group that has opposed the mine.

“On the other hand, a lot of the sulfide mines in the past haven’t really had a problem until after closure.

“It’s something that our grandchildren are going to inherit,” she said.

As demand for metals heats up, opposition to new mines is not cooling off. Experts say mining companies are wising up to the need for community buy-in. Eagle Mine’s Community Environmental Monitoring Program points to one option, but also its limitations.

So far, so good. But the story’s not over yet.
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The debate over U.S. aid to Myanmar will remain unresolved until at least early next year, as U.S. lawmakers once again this week delayed passage of a final budget for 2024.  

U.S. lawmakers are expected to pass a short-term continuing resolution that will fund the government at current levels through early next year that includes the BURMA Act, passed as part of the 2023 National Defense Authorization or NDAA.  

But the 2024 version of the budget will require the Senate and the House to reconcile differing visions of how to proceed with aid to Myanmar, also known as Burma.  

The version of the 2024 budget produced by the Democratic-majority U.S. Senate would appropriate more money to funding humanitarian assistance and democracy promotion programs in Myanmar.  

But activists have expressed concern about the delay and the version of the budget passed by the Republican-majority House of Representatives that would defund some programs.  

“We are urging that Congress appropriate sufficient money to implement the BURMA Act while continuing essential assistance in the face of ongoing political and humanitarian crisis in Burma,” the Campaign for a New Myanmar said in a statement.  

In its annual 2024 fiscal year markup of the State, Foreign Operations and Related Programs budget, released in July of this year, U.S. House lawmakers recommended $50 million to implement the current BURMA Act while also recommending a reduction of $1.4 billion for the U.S. Agency for International Development or USAID’s development assistance.

In July 2023, Myanmar’s National Unity Government, a shadow administration run from hiding and exile vying to oust the junta, and a trio of allied ethnic minority rebel armies, told VOA they had asked the U.S. Congress for $525 million in aid, including $200 million in nonlethal humanitarian aid. That number would be four times the $136 million previously appropriated by Congress.  

Current Myanmar Funding

The Burma Unification through Rigorous Military Accountability or BURMA Act was a response to the February 1, 2021, coup in which Myanmar’s democratically elected government was deposed by the military.  

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell – a leading voice in the U.S. Congress supporting democracy in Myanmar – marked the second anniversary of the coup on the Senate floor by praising the BURMA Act.  

“It made sanctions on senior junta officials mandatory,” McConnell said in February 2023, “Finally, the NDAA also notably authorized funding for programs to strengthen federalism in and among ethnic states in Burma, and for technical support and non-lethal assistance to Burma’s ethnic armed organizations and People’s Defense Forces to strengthen communication, command and control, and coordination of international relief and other operations between these entities.”

According to the Stimson Center, a non-partisan think tank, “it remains unclear if any new programs were created since December 2022. At this point, the U.S. continues to promote humanitarian aid as its unchanged policy towards Myanmar.”  

The United States has provided “nearly $2.1 billion since the military’s genocide and crimes against humanity towards the Rohingya that led 740,000 Rohingya to flee to neighboring Bangladesh in 2017,” Michael Schiffer, assistant administrator of the Bureau for Asia at the U.S. Agency for International Development, told House lawmakers in September 2023.

Late last month, the U.S. Treasury Department announced that starting in December, it will prohibit Americans from providing financial services to or for Myanma Oil and Gas Enterprise. The Treasury Department also sanctioned three new entities and five individuals connected to Myanmar’s military regime.

Rep. Gregory Meeks, the top Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee and the author of the BURMA Act, praised the move in a statement. 

“These sanctions will disrupt the junta’s access to the U.S. financial system and curtail its ability to commit further human rights violations. The United States and our partners must utilize all diplomatic and economic tools at our disposal to compel the junta to cease its atrocities, release unjustly detained individuals, facilitate unimpeded humanitarian access, and chart a pathway back toward democracy,” Meeks said. 

Zsombor Peter contributed to this report.
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Democratic Party candidates who favor the right to an abortion recently secured big electoral wins in several conservative states. But to what extent could the issue of reproductive rights influence how Americans vote in the 2024 presidential election? VOA’s Veronica Balderas Iglesias consulted with the experts.
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U.S. lawmakers are urging President Joe Biden to prioritize the release of U.S. citizens deemed wrongfully detained by China when he meets Chinese leader Xi Jinping on Wednesday in San Francisco. 

The U.S. State Department says Texas businessman Mark Swidan, Chinese American businessman Kai Li from Long Island, New York, and California pastor David Lin are wrongfully detained by China.

Republican Representative Michael McCaul, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, has repeatedly spoken out for Mark Swidan. McCaul urged Biden to put the release of Americans wrongfully detained by China high on the agenda for his meeting with Xi.

McCaul said in a statement sent to VOA Mandarin, “The Biden administration must stop making any concessions based on false promises and hold the [Chinese Communist Party] accountable for its gross human rights violations.”

In a letter to the White House on Nov. 8, Republican Representative Mike Gallagher, chairman of the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, along with 12 Republican members of the committee, asked that Biden raise 10 issues with Xi, one of which is to release all American citizens the U.S. government has determined to be wrongfully detained in China.

Democratic Senator Ben Cardin, chairman of the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee, also wrote to Biden, according to Reuters. 

“With the holiday season approaching, and the opportunity to start the New Year on a more positive note in bilateral U.S.-China relationships, I implore you to secure commitments from President Xi to release these Americans immediately,” Cardin wrote.

According to Reuters, a State Department spokesperson has noted that it continually raises wrongfully detained U.S. nationals during engagements with senior Chinese officials.

China says such cases are handled according to law.

Swidan, a Texas businessman, was arrested on drug-related charges in Guangdong Province in 2012 on his first trip to China.

In 2013, the Jiangmen Intermediate People’s Court in southern Guangdong convicted him of manufacturing and trafficking drugs.

In 2019, it handed down a death sentence with a two-year suspension. Under Chinese law, this means the sentence can be commuted to life imprisonment after two years, depending on the convict’s behavior.

This year, his appeal was denied, and the original sentence was upheld. 

The U.S. Embassy in China said in a statement, “We are disappointed by this decision and will continue to press for his immediate release and return to the United States.”

The Working Group on Arbitrary Detention of the United Nations Human Rights Council also characterized Swidan’s detention as illegal and called on Chinese authorities to immediately release him and provide compensation.

“It is 11 years this month since Mark was detained,” Swidan’s mother, Katherine Flint Swidan, 73, told VOA Mandarin. She said Biden must bring up those wrongfully detained in China when he meets Xi because “they are pawns.”

She told VOA Mandarin that the Chinese government has denied visitation requests from the U.S. consulate since September, and Beijing was transferring her son to Dongguan Prison, near the border with Hong Kong. 

She last heard her son’s voice during a call in 2018 and since then has communicated by letter.

In one, Swidan described dislocated knees, fluid accumulation in his legs and constant bleeding in his mouth.

She said Nicholas Burns, the U.S. ambassador to China, told her in August after visiting Swidan that he was in poor health and had suicidal tendencies.

Katherine Swidan lives in a small apartment in Luling, Texas, about 76 kilometers south of Austin. She needs a walker and relies on Social Security benefits to make ends meet.

She worries she may never see her son again and that he may never leave China safely.

 

Katherine Swidan said she spoke to Burns over the weekend, according to Reuters. She described the conversation as “disappointing” because the ambassador would not say whether Biden would raise her son’s name with Xi.

The U.S. Embassy in China has not provided updated information to VOA’s inquiries.

Kai Li’s son, Harrison Li, sent a letter to Biden last week, saying, “I’m following up now on my letters to you dated April 8, 2022, and June 15, 2022, to urge you to earn my father’s release in advance of your anticipated meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping in San Francisco later this month.”

Harrison Li told VOA Mandarin, “The detainee issue is the type of small but important thorn in the bilateral relationship that can and should actually be resolved through dialogue. Our government has an obligation to take advantage of the current apparent warming in U.S.-China relations to move progress forward on these longstanding detainee cases.”

Chinese authorities arrested Kai Li at the Shanghai airport in 2016. Two years later, he was convicted of espionage charges, which he denies, and sentenced to 10 years in Shanghai’s Qingpu Prison, where many foreigners are incarcerated.

A former fellow prisoner, released from the institution housing Kai Li, told VOA Mandarin in September that Kai Li was sometimes called on by prison staff to help them communicate with foreign prisoners who spoke English.

The former prisoner asked not to be identified because he is afraid of retaliation by Chinese authorities.

He said Kai Li translated when prisoners were taken to the hospital and also managed the prison library. He added that Kai Li also often spoke of his son Harrison and was proud of Harrison for constantly speaking up about his case.

David Lin, a pastor from Orange County, California, was arrested in 2006, then convicted and sentenced to life on what the U.S. government says were bogus charges of contract fraud. A year ago, before the Biden-Xi meeting on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Bali, Indonesia, Chinese authorities reduced Lin’s sentence to 24 years, meaning he will be 75 when freed in 2030.   

According to ChinaAid, Lin was detained in 2006 for helping a house church to build a church building, something that is illegal in China.

“Subsequently, authorities restricted him from leaving the country. He was arrested in 2009 on suspicion of ‘contract fraud.'”

Lin was sentenced to life in prison on the charge later that year.

Peter Humphrey, a British journalist turned consultant, was detained with his wife in 2013. They were found guilty of illegally obtaining information on Chinese citizens. Humphrey was sentenced to two and a half years in prison.

His wife was sentenced to two years. Both were released early in June 2015 for health reasons.

He now helps foreigners imprisoned by the Chinese government and campaigns for their release.

He believes there are more than three Americans wrongfully incarcerated by China.

Humphrey told VOA Mandarin, “The ordeals of the many Americans held in Xi’s jails should be high on the agenda for Biden’s meeting with Xi if Biden cares at all about wrongfully incarcerated American citizens. That means all American prisoners and not just a tiny select handful.”

“Not a single one of them has had a fair and transparent trial in front of an impartial judge because the Chinese legal and judicial system does not provide any such thing,” he said.

He suggested Biden hand over a list of all American citizens incarcerated in China, demand a mass prison transfer swap agreement to bring them home to an American facility, and then review their cases, none of which “would survive the scrutiny of an American court.”

Adrianna Zhang contributed to this report.

 
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