Chinese national who exposed rights abuses is freed from US detention after being granted asylum

Washington, Feb 5 (AP) Guan Heng, a Chinese national who exposed human rights abuses in his homeland, has been released from federal detention more than five months after being swept up in the Trump administration's mass immigration enforcement operation.
    Guan was released and reunited with his mother on Tuesday, nearly a week after being granted asylum by an immigration judge who determined that he faced a well-founded fear of persecution if sent back to China.
    "I'm in a great mood," Guan, 38, told The AP on Wednesday. "I didn't feel the excitement yesterday. I felt I was still in prison, but today many friends have come to see me."
    Guan, who is staying temporarily in Binghamton, New York, said he has not yet had time to think about what he will do in the longer term.
    His mother Luo Yun, who travelled to the US from her home in Taiwan to support her son, said she finally felt relieved.
    "For five and half months I didn't sleep one good sleep, but today I feel assured," Luo said.
    It was a rare successful outcome for an asylum seeker since President Donald Trump returned to office. At one point in detention, Guan was faced with deportation to Uganda, but the Department of Homeland Security dropped the plan in December after his plight raised public concerns and attracted attention on Capitol Hill. DHS, which has 30 days to appeal the immigration judge's January 28 ruling, did not immediately respond to a request to confirm if it has decided not to appeal.
    Rep Ro Khanna, the top Democrat on the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, said Guan should not have had to spend months in detention for the right outcome to be reached.
    "His release is a reminder that the rule of law and our moral duty to protect those who expose human rights abuses go hand in hand," Khanna said, vowing to press for transparency in similar cases.
    Guan in 2020 secretly filmed detention facilities in Xinjiang, adding to a body of evidence of what activists say are widespread rights abuses in the Chinese region, where as many as 1 million members of ethnic minorities, especially the Uyghurs, have been locked up.
    The Chinese government has denied allegations of rights abuses in Xinjiang, saying it runs vocational training programs to help local residents learn employable skills while rooting out radical thoughts. Beijing has silenced dissenting views on its practices in Xinjiang through a range of coercive means. (AP) RUK
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(This story has not been edited by THE WEEK and is auto-generated from PTI)