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Ex-Swedish China envoy acquitted over talks to free jailed bookseller Gui Minhai
- Anna Lindstedt was accused of attending an unauthorised meeting last year to get the Chinese-Swedish publisher freed from custody in China
- This is the first time since the 18th century that an ambassador has faced trial in Sweden
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A Stockholm court on Friday cleared Sweden’s former ambassador to Beijing of charges of overstepping her mandate by trying to negotiate the release of a dissident.
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Anna Lindstedt, who was envoy to Beijing between 2016 and 2019, was accused of brokering and attending an unauthorised meeting in January last year to get a Chinese-Swedish publisher freed from custody in China.
Lindstedt said she had been “unfailingly loyal” to Sweden throughout her 30-year career, telling the court: “It is unreal, not to say Kafkaesque to stand accused of crimes against national security.”
The Stockholm district court said in its verdict: “Overall, it is established that the objective requisites for the crime of arbitrariness at negotiations with foreign powers are in no part fulfilled.”
The case of dissident Gui Minhai – a five-year-saga beginning when he vanished while on holiday in Thailand – has strained relations between Sweden and China.
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Lindstedt is accused of brokering a meeting between the publisher’s daughter Angela Gui and businessmen with alleged ties to Beijing.
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