U.S. geologist Xue Feng is appealing his 8-year prison sentence. From the Wall Street Journal:
Xue Feng, a U.S. geologist convicted this month of trading in Chinese state secrets, has appealed to a Beijing court to overturn his eight-year sentence, his lawyer said Friday.
The lawyer, Tong Wei, said Mr. Xue’s appeal challenges a Beijing Number One Intermediate People’s Court decision that the oil industry information he was dealing in should be considered a national secret. He also appealed against the harshness of the penalty, which included a fine, Mr. Tong said.
Appeals in China rarely succeed. Mr. Tong said he is unsure how the court will respond.
Mr. Xue was first detained in late 2007 on allegations, outlined during his sentencing July 5, that he had tried to broker a deal to sell energy market data, including the location and other details of about 30,000 Chinese oil wells, to his then-U.S. employer, Englewood, Colo.-based IHS Inc. In the case, Mr. Xue argued that such information is widely traded and available in the global oil industry and that he didn’t know it was secret in China.
