China says employee of UK’s Hong Kong consulate has been freed

An employee of Britain’s consulate in Hong Kong who had been detained in mainland China for weeks has been released, the police said Saturday.

The employee, Simon Cheng, disappeared Aug 8 during a business trip to Shenzhen, a mainland Chinese city bordering Hong Kong, according to his family and girlfriend. The Chinese government said Wednesday that Cheng, a 28-year-old trade officer, had been held under administrative detention, without specifying what, if anything, he was alleged to have done wrong.

In a post Saturday morning on the social platform Weibo, the Public Security Bureau of Shenzhen’s Luohu District said that Cheng had confessed to unlawful activities and that he was released on Saturday after his 15-day detention ended. The statement did not say what the alleged unlawful activities were.

His family said in a post on Facebook on Saturday morning that Cheng had returned to Hong Kong.

“Simon and his family wish to have some time to rest and recover,” the post said. “We will explain more later.”

An hour or so after the message was posted, it disappeared from the family’s Facebook page. Cheng’s girlfriend and his family did not respond to requests for comment.

With Hong Kong roiled by protests that have prompted increasingly stern warnings from China’s central government, Cheng’s disappearance stirred fears that China had detained him as a warning to protesters, or to Britain, which has expressed support for the pro-democracy movement. It is unclear whether Cheng has joined in the protests.

On Thursday, a Chinese state-run newspaper reported that Cheng had been detained for soliciting prostitutes, an assertion that a friend dismissed as untrue. The government has made similar accusations in the past against political opponents and government critics it has held in China.

 2019 New York Times News Service