Học giả Feng Chongyi ở Sydney cho biết gia đình Yang đã thông báo cho ông rằng tòa án ở Bắc Kinh hôm nay tuyên án tử hình treo với Yang. Với án tử hình treo, phạm nhân sẽ được hoãn thi hành án 2 năm. Nếu không có sai phạm trong khoảng thời gian này, án sẽ giảm xuống tù chung thân.
"Đây là trường hợp bất công nghiêm trọng", Feng nói, nhấn mạnh Yang phủ nhận mọi cáo buộc. Ông cũng kêu gọi chính phủ Australia thúc đẩy để Yang được hưởng ân xá dựa trên tình trạng sức khỏe. Năm ngoái, bác sĩ phát hiện Yang có khối u 10 cm ở thận và có thể phải phẫu thuật. Nhà văn Australia Yang Hengjun. Ảnh: Sky
Chính phủ Australia sau đó xác nhận bản án đối với Yang, mô tả đây là "thông tin đau lòng". "Chính phủ Australia bàng hoàng trước bản án này", Ngoại trưởng Penny Wong nói, thêm rằng Canberra sẽ truyền tải phản ứng "bằng những lời lẽ quyết liệt nhất". Australia cũng sẽ triệu tập đại sứ Trung Quốc để phản đối.
Bộ Ngoại giao Trung Quốc chưa lên tiếng về phán quyết này.
Bà Wong tháng trước cho biết chính phủ Australia "vô cùng lo lắng vì vụ án của Yang bị trì hoãn liên tục", lưu ý ông đã bị giam 5 năm mà không có phán quyết nào được đưa ra.
Hai con trai của Yang, hiện sống ở Australia, đã viết thư cho Thủ tướng Albanese./-
He was supposedly working for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the southern province of Hainan, and the photo shows him wearing a boxy moss green police-style uniform.
There's just one small issue: The Ministry of Foreign Affairs doesn't have a uniform and the clothes Yang is wearing, according to a Beijing-based security analyst, belong to China's most powerful and feared spy agency, the Ministry of State Security (MSS).
"The MSS is a sprawling security intelligence service with wide ranging powers," said Clive Hamilton, co-author of an upcoming book about global Chinese influence operations, Hidden Hand.
"Its equivalent in Australia would be a combination of ASIO, the Australian Federal Police, plus ASIS — Australia's overseas intelligence organisation — all rolled into one, but with a lot more power and less subject to the constraints of the rule of law."
Today, the ABC can reveal that the Australian citizen did indeed work as a Chinese spy for 14 years.
However, according to friends and Australian officials Yang later definitively turned his back on the Chinese state to become a democracy activist and author.
That may be why, in January last year, he was detained in southern China, and has since been held by the Chinese Government over ill-defined espionage allegations, for more than 400 days.
"Yang Hengjun is a complicated person," said former Chinese diplomat Chen Yonglin, who defected to Australia in 2005 over growing disquiet about his role in monitoring Chinese dissidents here.
Chen said he met Yang several times in Australia: "My judgement is that he engaged in low-level intelligence work, and then slowly broke away from the system."
Yang, an Australian citizen and online democracy activist, was detained in Guangzhou in January last year and subsequently formally arrested over espionage allegations.
His wife Yuan Xiaoliang was also detained briefly at Guangzhou airport and subsequently interrogated by China's secret police.
ABC News can reveal she has been asked about her husband's connection with Western intelligence agencies and may herself face charges of endangering national security.
China has not provided any evidence to back up an assertion Yang was working for Western intelligence, and in August Australia's Foreign Minister took the unusual step of publicly stating Yang was not working for Australian intelligence agencies.
"There is no basis for any allegation Dr Yang was spying for the Australian Government," Foreign Minister Marise Payne said in August.
The ABC has spoken to two Australian Government officials, as well as a person close to China's Ministry of Public Security and a friend of the detained writer.
All agreed to discuss Yang's case only on condition of anonymity, given the sensitive nature of the topic.
All four sources told the ABC that Yang had worked for the MSS.
The ABC has also spoken to one of Yang's closest Australian friends, Sydney academic Professor Feng Chongyi.
Professor Feng said he had suspicions about Yang's background soon after meeting him, when the aspiring writer provided his résumé as part of an application to study under the University of Technology Sydney scholar.
"He graduated from Fudan [University's] international politics department — it's well known in China that that department trains a lot of spies," Professor Feng said.
Years later, Professor Feng was able to confirm with a person familiar with Yang's story that the writer had, in fact, served with MSS.