The leading Chinese dissident, Mr Wei Jingsheng, was taken to hospital immediately after his arrival in the United States from Beijing following his release from jail this weekend.
Mr Wei (47) had planned to fly to New York for treatment for heart and other medical problems after arriving at Detroit airport but instead he was brought to a hospital in Detroit.
His release 11 days after the Chinese President, Mr Jiang Zemin, finished a state visit to the US, has been welcomed by President Clinton and the Secretary of State, Ms Madeleine Albright.
During that visit, Mr Clinton had sharp exchanges with Mr Jiang over the question of human rights in China and the US has been pressing Beijing for the release of a list of political dissidents.
The release of Mr Wei also comes just before a meeting today in Washington between the Chinese Justice Minister, Mr Xiao Yang, and the US Attorney General, Ms Janet Reno. During the Chinese Communist Party congress last September, Mr Xiao had hinted at the possibility that Mr Wei could be released on medical parole.
Mr Wei was accompanied on his flight from Beijing by a State Department official who would not allow him to be interviewed on arrival at Detroit. He will meet members of his family who are travelling there.
Mr Wei was freed from a salt works labour camp near Beijing on Saturday evening and arrived in the capital early yesterday, where he met his father, brother and sister in a hostel. Accompanied by a US diplomat, he was driven in a van onto the tarmac of Beijing International Airport and placed on board Northwest Airlines flight 88 to Detroit. It took off for the 13hour journey at 11.30 a.m. after a 90-minute delay.
Almost two decades of solitary confinement in Chinese camps had ruined Mr Wei's health, his brother, Mr Wei Xiaotao said, but he was "in high spirits because he is the sort of person who is always in good spirits".
Human rights organisations in the US also welcomed the release.
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