Chinese activist, family arrive in U.S.

NEWARK -- A Chinese legal activist who was suddenly allowed to leave Beijing arrived in the United States on Saturday, ending a nearly monthlong diplomatic tussle that had tested U.S.-China relations.

Chen Guangcheng had been hurriedly taken from a hospital hours earlier and put on a plane for the United States after Chinese authorities surprisingly told him to pack and prepare to leave. He landed Saturday evening at Newark Liberty International Airport and was whisked to Manhattan, where he will be staying.

Dressed in a white shirt and khaki pants and using crutches, his right leg in a cast, Chen was greeted with cheers when he arrived at the Greenwich Village apartment where he will live with his wife and two children. The complex houses faculty and graduate students of New York University, where Chen is expected to attend law school.

"For the past seven years, I have never had a day's rest," he said through a translator, "so I have come here for a bit of recuperation for body and in spirit."

The arrival of Chen apparently concluded nearly a month of uncertainty and years of mistreatment by local authorities for the activist.

After seven years of prison and house arrest, Chen, who is blind, made a daring escape from his rural village in April and was given sanctuary inside the U.S. Embassy, triggering a diplomatic standoff over his fate.

With Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton in Beijing for annual high-level discussions, officials struck a deal that would have let Chen walk free, only to see him have second thoughts. That forced new negotiations that led to an agreement to send him to the United States.

Chen's expected attendance at NYU comes from his association with Jerome Cohen, a law professor there who advised Chen while he was in the U.S. Embassy. The two met when Chen came to the United States on a State Department program in 2003, and Cohen has been a staunch advocate for him since.

Chen gained recognition for crusading for the disabled and for farmers' rights and fighting against forced abortions in his rural community. That angered local officials, who seemed to wage a personal vendetta against him.