Wang's flight from Beijing arrived at Detroit Metropolitan Airport shortly before 10 a.m. EDT, He was immediately taken to Henry Ford Hospital where doctors said he was in stable condition.
"He has some fatigue. He's been through a lot in the last 48 hours," said Dr. Thomas Royer, chief medical officer at Henry Ford.
Royer said Wang had undergone preliminary tests yesterday with more scheduled for tomorrow.
He said Wang complained of a chronic cough for several years and headaches, especially when he reads. Specialists will examine Wang tomorrow for those problems.
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| AP PHOTO Prominent Chinese dissident Wang Dan, shown here at a May 1989 demonstration in Beijing's Tiananmen Square, was released from jail yesterday on medical grounds. |
Wang is expected to remain at Henry Ford until late today or early Tuesday, Royer said.
"He's doing great. I'm so happy to see him doing so good," said Shen Tong, president of the Democracy for China Fund in Newton, Mass., and a former classmate of Wang's at Beijing University.
"He's in very good spirits. He's very upbeat," Shen said. "I think all those prison years made a difference, but it's a positive difference."
Shen said Wang would speak publicly soon, but he was unsure when.
The official Xinhua News Agency said Wang was released on medical parole but did not give details. Wang has suffered for months with a throat infection and headaches that his family believes may indicate a brain tumor.
His mother, Wang Linyun, said she saw her son briefly before he boarded the airplane in Beijing.
"He's ill. He looked the same as he has for a while," she said in a telephone interview before he arrived in Detroit.
Doctors said preliminary tests performed on Wang could not immediately determine whether he had a tumor. An MRI is scheduled for tomorrow.
Wang's release came two months before a planned visit to China by President Clinton. In the past, China has tried to use such releases to improve the atmosphere before high-level contacts, prompting human rights groups to accuse it of playing "hostage politics."
"It's very welcome news," said White House national security spokesman Eric Rubin, who's with Clinton in Santiago, Chile. "This is something we've raised repeatedly with the Chinese and we consider it a very positive step."
Wang, 29, is the second leading Chinese dissident released for medical reasons in the past six months. Wei Jingsheng, the most prominent government critic, was sent to the United States in November.
Wei spent five-days at Henry Ford Hospital before going on to New York City. Wang also is scheduled to continue on to New York City.
Such releases suit China's recent policy of encouraging dissidents to leave, in hopes they will lose their political effectiveness in exile.
"It is good news for Wang Dan as an individual, except that once again, it appears to be a release conditional on exile," said Catherine Baber, spokeswoman for Amnesty International in Hong Kong.
As a student, Wang led marches and gave speeches during the 1989 Tiananmen Square pro-democracy protests. After the army violently crushed the protests, Wang's name topped the government most-wanted list.
He served 3 1/2 years in prison and emerged unrepentant in 1993. Over 27 months - before he was taken away by police in May 1995 - Wang criticized the ruling Communist Party in essays published abroad, met with other activists and petitioned for democracy.
04-20-98
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