Police in China Release Human Rights Lawyer

BEIJING, March 8 -- A prominent Chinese human rights lawyer was released Saturday after two days of secret police detention.

Teng Biao, 34, said police questioned him about articles calling for an independent and fair legal system that he has written for his blog and overseas Chinese Web sites. China's Communist Party controls the judiciary, which routinely imprisons dissidents after convicting them in secret trials.

"I was released around 1:40 this afternoon, and they put me down at a place near my home," Teng said in a telephone interview. "The police were from the Beijing Public Security Bureau, but they don't allow me to tell any more details."

Teng has defended dissidents and been an outspoken critic of human rights abuses in China, especially as international scrutiny has increased ahead of the 2008 Olympic Games, which open here Aug. 8.

Witnesses said Teng was forced into a black Jetta without license plates after he had driven home Thursday evening, according to his wife, who reported him missing that night.

Teng's supporters had planned to petition authorities to release him and Hu Jia, an online activist in Beijing who was detained in December and charged in late January with inciting subversion.

Teng said he was not beaten or told to stop representing clients. He was unsure why police arrested him this week, while security is high during the annual meeting in Beijing of the National People's Congress, China's legislature.

Asked whether he had been told to keep quiet during the Olympics, Teng said, "This is not very convenient to say."