A group of Australians detained by foreign governments have called on democracies to become more creative and flexible in their response to so-called hostage diplomacy.
Thinking “outside the box” and being creative in diplomatic solutions was crucial.
Former detainees Cheng Lei, Dr Kylie Moore-Gilbert and Professor Sean Turnell urged a rethink on how liberal democracies around the world could band together to respond to authoritarian regimes imprisoning foreigners for leverage.
Together they launched the advocacy group Australian Wrongful and Arbitrary Detention Alliance at an Australian Strategic Policy Institute event on Wednesday.
Ms Cheng, who spent more than three years in a Chinese jail, was an anchor for the state-run China Global Television Network and was accused of national security-related offences before being arrested in August 2020.
The mother tearfully spoke of the impact her detention had on her loved ones and children.
“I wanted to shout how much I missed this country across the ocean,” she said.
“It is like an earthquake that reverberates to this day that shapes everything to the core.
“There is a huge crater that I’m trying to fill.”
The Sky News journalist said she had grappled with the “opaque, absolute isolation and mental torture,” and at times wished she had been guilty of a real crime so she could be granted basic rights.
Ms Cheng said Australia as a middle power and US ally was an easy target, and the country should join forces with other Western democracies to “increase our power” through engagement and dialogue.
Dr Moore-Gilbert was imprisoned in Iran in 2018 on trumped up espionage charges, and was arrested by the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps after attending an academic conference.
She said hostage diplomacy was a business model for Iran, with authorities very proficient at it.
“I would have been very much in favour of individuals explicitly involved in my unlawful arrest and incarceration and psychological torture, to be singled out and symbolically sanctioned,” Dr Moore-Gilbert said.
Professor Turnell was a former economic adviser to Myanmar’s democratic government, and was imprisoned after a military coup.
Following his detention, he said his belief in democracy and the rule of law had been enhanced, as had his faith in human nature.
Dr Moore-Gilbert said her fellow prisoners who she regarded as her “sisters” gave her strength to endure the ordeal.
Professor Turnell said he was helped by knowing and feeling the support coming from Australia, in addition to the compassion of the people he was imprisoned with.
Jailed Australian writer Dr Yang Hengjun was handed a suspended death sentence after he was found guilty of espionage charges in China in February.
Foreign Minister Penny Wong told her Chinese counterpart during a meeting on Wednesday that the Australian government will continue to advocate on his behalf.
Source Agencies
