China Frees, Then Expels N.Y. Times Reporter

New York Times correspondent John F. Burns, in police custody for nearly a week, was freed and expelled from China today for what the government called “activities incompatible with his status as a journalist.”

The official New China News Agency quoted an unidentified official of the Peking State Security Bureau as saying Burns left Peking this morning. It did not give his destination.

The agency quoted the official as saying Burns “engaged in activities incompatible with his status as a journalist by deliberately breaking into Chinese areas closed to aliens, thereby violating the law governing aliens’ entry into and exit from the Peoples’ Republic of China.”

The agency said that “after investigation of the case . . . the Peking State Security Bureau yesterday decided to expel Burns from the territory of China.”

Chinese authorities said earlier that Burns was suspected of spying.

As Burns ended his sixth day in custody Tuesday, New York Times Executive Editor A. M. Rosenthal and Foreign Editor Warren Hoge met with Li Zhaoxing, a deputy director of the Foreign Ministry’s Information Department, and Hoge later said he saw “no sign of any progress.”

Also at the meeting was U.S. Embassy press counselor Lynn Noah.

The editors arrived here Saturday to press for Burns’ release.

Hoge quoted Li as saying that China values its relations with the United States and the New York Times but that the Burns case was a police matter.

Li contested Rosenthal’s assertion that the case was seriously damaging China’s image as an increasingly open country, saying it would show that China is a law-abiding nation, according to Hoge.

Burns, a 41-year-old British citizen, was detained by police at Peking airport on July 17 as he prepared to leave China on a vacation with his family. He was questioned for 15 hours about a motorcycle trip he took in early July to an area of central China off limits to foreigners.

At midnight, he was taken home, where police searched his home, and at 4 a.m. Friday, following orders from the authorities, his wife drove him to the Paozhu detention center in northern Peking.

Authorities had said he was being investigated on suspicion of intelligence activities and that he would be detained until the investigation ended. Under Chinese law, he had no access to an attorney.

Burns’ wife, Jane Scott-Long, and the couple’s two small children were reunited with Burns on Monday for about 30 minutes. The next day, Scott-Long was told that family members are allowed only one visit with people in detention and that she would not be allowed to visit her husband again.

No formal charges were filed against the reporter, and Rosenthal, who met with Burns separately Monday, said he was told by a Chinese security official at the meeting that no evidence of espionage had been uncovered.