Wife of Librarian Freed,
Husband Still Detained in China
The wife of Dickinson College librarian Song Yongyi has been released from custody, some three months after she and her husband were detained by Chinese officials in Beijing and accused of spying. Helen Yao arrived back home in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, November 19, three days after she was released.
Yao speaks limited English, but said in the November 23 Philadelphia Inquirer through Neil Weissman, dean of Dickinson, that she and her husband were held in separate quarters in Beijing “in conditions that were not physically onerous.” She said she had seen her husband before she left, and he appeared unharmed. Song is a scholarly authority on China’s Cultural Revolution and went back to their native country to conduct further research.
Weissman said Dickinson officials would continue to seek Song’s release. A State Department spokesman told the Inquirer that he knew of Yao’s release and that his department was also continuing to work for her husband’s release.
Posted November 29, 1999.
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