China releases leading dissident

Liu helped set up a pro-democracy party after Tiananmen crackdown

Prominent Chinese dissident Liu Jingsheng has been released from prison after more than a decade behind bars.

The pro-democracy campaigner, 50, freed more than two years before his sentence was due to end, has suffered health problems.

He said he cared about the Chinese people but stopped short of saying he would continue political activities.

Separately, dozens of people in Beijing have been arrested ahead of another activist's trial.

Mr Liu told French news agency AFP that his political rights and freedom of speech would be limited for four years after his release, but his way of thinking had not changed.

Mr Liu joined the 1978 Democracy Wall movement and helped set up the China Freedom and Democracy Party after the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators.

He was detained in 1992 and sentenced two years later on charges of "organising and leading a counter-revolutionary organisation" and "inciting counter-revolutionary subversion".

At least two people were detained by Beijing police on Saturday and some 20 more prevented from leaving home as they tried to attend the trial of activist Ye Guozhu, AFP said.