Campaigners welcome China release for 5 feminist activists

Rights groups on Tuesday welcomed China's release of five feminist activists whose detention for more than a month triggered an international diplomatic outcry, but said concerns remain about their case.

The five, all aged 32 or younger, were taken into custody shortly before International Women's Day last month as they were preparing to hand out leaflets about sexual harassment on public transport.

The European Union, US Secretary of State John Kerry and his predecessor Hillary Clinton had all issued calls for their freedom, while Beijing said it was an internal issue.

All five were released on Monday, which Chinese criminal lawyers said was the deadline for prosecutors to formally charge them.

But Liang Xiaojun, one of their attorneys, said: "In the eyes of the police, they are still suspects... they will need to regularly update authorities on their whereabouts."

William Nee, China researcher at Amnesty International, said their release was an "encouraging breakthrough", but added: "The authorities must now follow through and drop all charges and restrictions against the women."

"Women's rights campaigners should be free to advance human rights without fear of intimidation or the threat of detention," he said. "Yet the reality today is that rights activists are systematically monitored, harassed and suppressed."

The five women had been linked to several stunts in different Chinese cities aimed at highlighting issues such as domestic violence and the poor provision of women's toilets.

Police originally told lawyers the activists were suspected of "picking quarrels and provoking trouble", a vague charge increasingly used by authorities under President Xi Jinping to detain and jail protesters for holding small-scale demonstrations.

They later changed the accusation to "illegal assembly", which carries the same maximum punishment of five years imprisonment.

China's ruling Communist Party does not tolerate organised opposition, and often clamps down on small activist groups.

But the detentions were seen by rights groups as unusually harsh given the small scale of the women's stunts and the fact that they had been praised in China's state-run media.

"What they've done has actually furthered legal protection of women's rights and strengthened the rule of law in China," said Lu Jun, of the Chinese campaign group Yirenping, whose office was raided after it backed the five.

"We feel heartened at the news and impressed by advocacy for their release from inside China and outside China," Lu said, describing their detention as "a glaring injustice".