Politico: US released a Chinese detainee to free imprisoned American

The Biden administration brokered the release last month of David Lin, a US citizen jailed in China for 16 years, by trading him for an unidentified Chinese citizen in US custody, according to three people familiar with the deal, Politico said, Report informs.

The State Department hasn’t publicly disclosed that it exchanged Lin for a Chinese national and declined to answer questions about how it negotiated his freedom after his September 15 release. That’s a marked difference from the very public prisoner exchanges that the US has brokered with Russia in recent years.

The three people did not provide the identity of the Chinese citizen. All were granted anonymity because they weren’t authorized to publicly discuss sensitive diplomatic negotiations.