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e-money: Press Review IV: E-mail trail

this message entered the list on Wed, 16 Dec 1998 14:37:56 +0100
it has been sent by Jens-Ingo Brodesser


found in
wired news on 16 dec 1998 pst
http://www.wired.com/news/news/politics/story/16485.html

==================== start quoted text ====================

                        China Delays Net Trial
                        Reuters

                        7:35 a.m.  25.Nov.98.PST
                        SHANGHAI -- China has delayed the closed-door
                        trial of a man accused of using the Internet to
                        undermine the state, and on Wednesday his wife
                        called for an open court hearing.

                        Lin Hai, a 30-year-old computer engineer, had
                        been scheduled to go on trial on Thursday. He is
                        accused of inciting subversion of state power, but
                        a Shanghai court has postponed the case
                        indefinitely, said Lin's wife, Xu Hong.

                        "They did not say when it might get underway,"
                        Xu told Reuters. "When it starts, I would want it to
                        be in open court so there would be public
                        scrutiny."

                        Lin, who was arrested in March, has been accused
                        of using the Internet to send tens of thousands
                        of email addresses to VIP Reference, a dissident
                        publication based in the United States. If
                        convicted, he could face up to life in prison.

                        The case was to be heard in a closed-door
                        session at the Shanghai Number One
                        Intermediate Court. Even the defendant's wife
                        was to be barred from court.

                        "Of course I believe I should be at the trial," Xu
                        said. "But the hearing should be open to the
                        public as well."

                        The court offered no explanation for its sudden
                        decision to postpone the hearing, but Xu said it
                        could be a result of international interest in the
                        case. The case has been ignored by the official
                        Chinese media but has attracted widespread
                        attention abroad.

                        Some 1.2 million Chinese are on the Internet,
                        and the total is expected to reach 5 million by
                        2000. The government has embraced the
                        Internet, but so have a number of dissident
                        groups.

                        VIP Reference, one of many dissident
                        publications that have sprung up online, says it
                        sends information to 250,000 email accounts in
                        China from various email addresses in the United
                        States.

                        Court documents called VIP Reference a hostile
                        foreign organization, and claimed it used data
                        provided by Lin "to disseminate large numbers of
                        articles aimed at inciting subversion of state
                        power and the socialist system."

                        Lin ran a now-defunct software company that set
                        up Web sites and provided job searches for
                        multinational companies. His supporters say he
                        frequently exchanged or purchased email
                        addresses to build up a database for his online
                        job search business.

                        Copyright© 1998 Reuters Limited.

==================== end quoted text ====================


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