Detained Writer's Wife Stopped From Leaving China

A detained Chinese-Australian writer's wife has been refused permission to leave China six months after her husband was taken into custody, their lawyer said on Monday.

Yang Hengjun, a 53-year-old visiting scholar at Columbia University in New York and a former Chinese diplomat, has been detained since January 19, when he arrived at the Guangzhou Airport with his wife, Xiaoliang Yuan, and his 14-year-old stepdaughter.

Yuan, an Australian resident, had been prevented from flying to Australia from Beijing airport on Thursday, Australian lawyer Rob Stary said.

"There's an exit ban on her leaving. She was escorted to a hotel and interrogated for a couple of hours but is not formally in detention," Stary said.

"We don't know what the nature of the interrogation was; we assume it's in relation to her husband, who has been described as a democracy activist and journalist," Stary added.

China in January said Yang had been detained for allegedly "endangering the country's national security," a vague charge frequently levelled at critics of the ruling Communist Party.

Once described as China's "most influential political blogger", Yang became an Australian citizen in 2000.

Yuan and her daughter have been living with relatives since he was detained.

Foreign Minister Marise Payne on Monday released a statement on Yang's case, but did not comment on his wife's plight.

"The Australian government has raised Dr Yang's case regularly with China at senior levels," Payne said.

"We have requested his case be treated fairly, transparently, and expeditiously," she added.

Australia continued to have consular access and had asked that Yang be granted immediate access to his Chinese lawyers, Payne said.

Stary said Australia should be doing more to get Yuan and her child out of China, despite them being Chinese and not Australian citizens.

Yang's six-month detention order expires on July 27. He could then be charged, which could "make her capacity to travel even more restrictive", Stary said.

"She's completely the innocent party. Her movements have been curtailed really because of her relationship with her husband," Stary said.

Stary described as "curious" Australia's quick success in getting North Korea to release Australian Alek Sigley released last week after Sigley was accused of spying while in Pyongyang.

Australia had abrogated its responsibility to an Australian resident by failing to persuade China to let Yuan leave after six months, Stary said. (AP)