Artist and political activist Ai Weiwei has been released by Chinese authorities after more than two and a half months of detention.
Beijing
police said they released Weiwei on bail "because of his good attitude in
confessing his crimes" and because he has a chronic illness, state media reported.
The artist's detention on April 3 sparked an international outcry. He vanished after he was detained by police at Beijing airport.
It was later revelaed he was held on suspicion of economic crimes, but police did not notify his family of detention.
The
Xinhua report added: "The decision comes also in consideration of the
fact that Ai has repeatedly said he is willing to pay the taxes he
evaded," police said.
"The Beijing Fake Cultural Development Ltd,
a company Ai controlled, was found to have evaded a huge amount of
taxes and intentionally destroyed accounting documents."
The article gave no details of what has happened to several friends and colleagues of Ai, who went missing shortly after him.
Ai's
family said they had only heard of his release through the media.
Nicholas Bequelin, Asia researcher for Human Rights Watch, welcomed news of the 54-year-old artist's release.
"His
detention was political and his release is political. It is the result
of a huge domestic and international outcry that forced the government
to this resolution … I think Beijing realised how damaging it was to
hold China's most famous artist in detention," he said.
Bequelin
said he expected Ai to be allowed to return home, but that he would
probably not be allowed to travel abroad without official permission
and would have to report to police regularly.
The Chinese
government has said that Ai was arrested for for economic crimes,
although his family believe it was retaliation for his social and
political activism.
