Kevin Rudd, the Prime Minister of Australia, was right to comment this week that China should hold criminal trials in open court, after the conviction of Stern Hu, an Australian citizen employed by the mining multinational Rio Tinto, for taking bribes and stealing trade secrets; much of the proceedings was behind closed doors, in the absence of Australian consular officials.
Non-Chinese companies carrying on business in China should be able to assess whether their employees are likely to be treated fairly in the country's courts, though Rio Tinto exports vast amounts of iron ore to China and would be extremely unlikely to stop doing so, even if Mr. Hu and his three Chinese co-accused had insisted they were innocent to the bitter end.
When Mr. Hu and three other employees of Rio Tinto were arrested in July, 2009, it seemed odd that the allegations against them included appropriation of state secrets. It was hard to see how the negotiations with an association of steel-mill owners, on which Mr. Hu and his colleagues were working, would involve state secrets.
Mr. Hu has now admitted to having accepted bribes, a comparatively straightforward crime, though the trade-secrets charges remain unclear; the state-secrets charges seem to have faded away.
The Chinese foreign ministry has called Mr. Rudd's remarks "irresponsible." But there is nothing reckless or anti-Chinese about invoking the principle of open courts. Secret proceedings in Canada or Australia would run the risk of abuses, much as they do in China.
China should open its courtroom door, on the grounds of general principles of procedural and substantive justice, as well on the narrower ground of giving confidence to foreign citizens and companies that they will be treated fairly.