The wife of a City University professor held on the mainland for alleged espionage has made an impassioned plea to US congressmen for help to secure his release.
Amy Liu Yingli, wife of Li Shaomin, 45, urged United States President George W. Bush to scrap a planned visit to Shanghai in protest at the detention of her husband and other American academics in China.
Ms Liu attended the US House of Representatives Committee on International Relations in Washington on Tuesday.
Her appeal to Mr Bush came after Dr Li's father received a call from the Chinese authorities on Sunday telling him his son had been indicted for spying for Taiwan. Dr Li, an associate professor of marketing at City University, was charged on May 15.
Dr Li was arrested on February 25 as he crossed the border to Shenzhen. The couple migrated to the US in the 1980s.
During the committee hearing, Ms Liu told US congressmen: 'My husband, Dr Li Shaomin, is an outstanding scholar. He has devoted himself to teaching and to his academic research. He is not a dissident. He is not a political activist. He is a teacher.
'My husband has done nothing wrong . . . four months of grief and pain, four months of worry and fear. But we are American citizens. We should not have to live in such fear.'
