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SHANGHAI: The highly sensitive trial of four staff of Anglo-Australian mining giant Rio Tinto opened Monday in a case that has strained ties with Canberra and raised concerns about doing business in China.
Australian national Stern Hu, who heads Rio Tinto's office in Shanghai, and three Chinese employees are being tried on bribery and trade secrets charges.
A crowd of about 50 journalists gathered outside the Shanghai No 1 Intermediate People's Court but only a few reporters, who appeared to be from state-run domestic media, were allowed in.
Court spokeswoman Wang Haiwen confirmed to AFP that the trial had begun, adding that it was "open to the public." She gave no further details.
Canberra has called for transparency in the three-day trial, but hearings on the industrial espionage charges will be closed, adding to questions over whether the men will get a fair hearing in the politically charged case.
Australian Consul-General Tom Connor declined to comment to reporters as he headed into the courthouse but said he would speak to the media later.
Lawyers for the Chinese defendants were also seen entering the courthouse but they made no comment.
The four defendants were arrested last July during contentious iron ore contract negotiations which later collapsed, and after Rio snubbed a near 20-billion-dollar cash injection from state-run Chinese mining firm Chinalco.
The trial is widely being seen as a test of whether China is willing to honour commitments to foreign investors and be a responsible member of the world community.
Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd told China the world will be watching the trial "very closely".
"The Australian government will be monitoring the trial very carefully," Rudd told reporters on Monday. "China has a different legal system to Australia, China has a different legal system to the rest of the world."
Australia has said consular officials will attend trial sessions on the bribe-taking charges and it has asked China to reconsider the closure of the trade secrets hearings.
Beijing has insisted the case will be handled by the book and it will "fully guarantee" the rights of the defendants, who include Chinese nationals Wang Yong, Ge Minqiang and Liu Caikui.
"It will be regarded as a litmus test of the status of the young Chinese legal system. Transparency matters," Joerg Wuttke, president of the European Union Chamber of Commerce in China, told AFP.
- AFP/sc
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