US welcomes three Americans formerly detained in China

Three Americans, described by the State Department as wrongfully detained in China for years, are back on US soil following a prisoner swap, according to a senior US official familiar with the negotiations.

The State Department announced that Mark Swidan of Houston, Texas, Kai Li of Long Island, New York, and John Leung, a permanent resident of Hong Kong, would soon be “reunited with their families for the first time in many years.”

Secretary of State Antony Blinken confirmed he spoke with Swidan, Li, and Leung during their return journey. “I told them how glad I was that they were in good health and that they’ll soon be reunited with their loved ones,” Blinken said in a post on X.

While specific details of the agreement remain undisclosed, a senior official told ABC News that the arrangement involved the release of three Chinese nationals who had been convicted of espionage.

China also lifted an exit ban on another American who had been barred from leaving the country, the official said. The Chinese embassy declined to comment on the release.

Mark Swidan’s mother, Katherine Swidan, shared her joy on Facebook with a photo of her son wearing a US flag sweatshirt, posing alongside US ambassador to China Nicholas Burns and Roger Carstens, the Special Envoy for Hostage Affairs, aboard the plane. “My son Free at Last,” she wrote.

Harrison Li, Kai Li’s son, expressed his gratitude in a statement on X. “We are thrilled that Kai is on his way home along with [Mark Swidan] and John Leung. Thank you, [President Joe Biden], and everyone that made this day possible at long last. Please keep bringing them home,” he said.

The three Americans were arrested under different charges that US officials and humanitarian groups described as arbitrary and unlawful. Swidan, 49, had been in China in 2012 for business and was later accused of involvement in drug manufacturing. He was sentenced to death in 2019, a decision the United Nations condemned as a “deprivation of liberty.”

Swidan’s mother recalled his arrest in a 2022 video played during a Congressional-Executive Committee on China hearing.
“While I was on the phone with him at his hotel, I heard a lot of commotion, and he said, ‘Hold on, mom.’ And Chinese police got into his apartment.

They said, ‘We need to take you in for questioning,’ and the phone hung up,” she said. She also recounted his grim promise to her: “I will come home in the box of ashes, or walking off the plane, but I will come home.”

Kai Li, 62, a Shanghai-born naturalised US citizen, was detained in 2016 after landing in Shanghai. He was sentenced to 10 years on charges of sharing “state secrets,” though his family maintains these were routine communications required for compliance with US export laws. His son testified before Congress about the toll of his father’s imprisonment, saying, “I have now spent a third of my life missing my dad. Every day, I wake up and shudder at the thought of him crammed into a tiny cell with as many as 11 other people and no climate control, experiencing the mental and physical anguish.”

John Leung, 78, was arrested in April 2021 on espionage charges and sentenced to life imprisonment in 2023, along with other penalties. Negotiations for their release reportedly spanned several years, with President Joe Biden raising the issue during a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping earlier this month in Peru.

The prisoner swap also involved Yanjun Xu, a Chinese intelligence officer convicted of attempting economic espionage and sentenced to 20 years, and Ji Chaoqun, who was serving an 8-year sentence for conspiracy to act as an agent of a foreign government.

Lawmakers celebrated the news of the Americans’ return. Rep. Michael McCaul of Texas remarked, “I’m overjoyed to hear Mark Swidan is finally on his way home to Texas, just in time for Thanksgiving. Mark suffered for 12 long years in a Chinese prison for a crime he clearly did not commit.” Similarly, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said, “After nearly a decade of imprisonment by the Chinese government, Kai Li is finally on his way back to American soil and to freedom.”

(ABC NEWS)

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