BEIJING, China - A Tibetan music scholar serving an 18-year sentence for spying was released from prison on medical parole and allowed to fly to the United States today, one month before President Bush's planned visit to China.
Ngawang Choephel, 34, who reportedly suffers from hepatitis and pulmonary bronchitis, had served about six years of his sentence. China rarely frees Tibetan political prisoners before they have served their full terms.
Choephel is a Fulbright scholar who taught at Middlebury College in Vermont. He returned to his native Tibet in 1995 to document traditional music and dance, but disappeared. More than a year later, China revealed that he had been sentenced to 18 years in prison on charges of spying and "engaging in separatism," the phrase China uses for opposing Beijing's rule over Tibet.
China conquered the isolated mountainous region in 1951 and suppressed an uprising there in 1959. Thousands of Tibetans, led by their spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, fled to India and established a government-in-exile.
Western human rights activists and governments condemned Choephel's arrest and conviction, arguing that China presented no serious evidence that he committed either crime.
Choephel's release, announced by a human rights group, was clearly timed as part of the run-up to the planned Feb. 21 summit in Beijing between Bush and Chinese President Jiang Zemin. China traditionally releases a political prisoner either just before or after summits with U.S. leaders. Choephel's release was the second such early release in less than a month.
Choephel's name was on a "list of concern" submitted by Washington before Secretary of State Colin L. Powell visited Beijing in July. John Kamm, head of the San Francisco-based Dui Hua Foundation, which deals with political prisoners in China, also lobbied for information on his case.
Kamm said Choephel was put aboard a Northwest Airlines flight to Detroit today. He then flew to Washington, where he said upon arrival, "I'm so happy to be home," according to the Associated Press.
Choephel was freed under a previously unannounced 1990 regulation allowing medical parole for prisoners who have served at least one-third of their sentence and contracted illnesses in prison.
Kamm said the decision raises the possibility that China could release others who are believed to have serious health problems, including Xu Wenli and Wang Youcai, founders of the banned China Democracy Party.
Choephel's release was welcomed by John Ackerly, president of the Washington-based International Campaign for Tibet. However, Ackerly pointed out that China continues to hold many prominent Tibetans in jail, including the 12-year-old Panchen Lama, Tibet's second-most important Buddhist leader, who is one of the world's youngest political prisoners.