Jailed Chinese journalist appeals against 'shameless' sentencing

Gao Yu, the 71-year-old mainland journalist jailed for seven years last week for allegedly leaking state secrets, has criticised her sentencing as "shameless" and an affront to legal justice, her lawyer said yesterday.

Lawyer Shang Baojun visited her at a Beijing detention centre yesterday and learned that she had filed an appeal against the Beijing No 3 Intermediate Court's verdict on Friday that she had "illegally provided overseas personnel with state secrets".

"From the points of view of evidence, conviction and the length of the sentence, the verdict was an affront to legal justice," her appeal said. Shang said the appeal document provided by the detention centre allowed enough space for only one sentence from defendants.

"She said she had received jail sentences before and felt those were shameless enough - but the level of shamelessness of her latest sentence was beyond her imagination," Shang said. Gao has served jail terms totalling seven years for her writing.

Shang said the case against Gao lacked evidence, apart from her confession on state television last May, which she had been coerced into making because of threats against her son. He was initially detained along with her but was later released on bail.

Gao's other lawyer, Mo Shaoping, said earlier that the prosecution produced no evidence to support its allegations that Gao used Skype software to send an internal Communist Party circular called Document No 9 to the US-based news website Mingjing in July, 2013, but the court still accepted it as truth.