The wife of former Nissan chairman Carlos Ghosn has urged Donald Trump to raise her husband's case with Japan's prime minister, Shinzo Abe at the G20 summit of world leaders this month.
“I'd like President Trump to speak to Prime Minister Abe about fair conditions, fair trial conditions and to let me speak to my husband and also to respect this presumption of innocence until proven guilty,” Carole Ghosn told the BBC.
Mr Ghosn was arrested in November on charges relating to millions of dollars of income that Japanese authorities allege was undeclared.
He has since been arrested three further times and charged with additional offences including breach of trust and attempting to enrich himself by $5m (£4m) at Nissan’s expense.
The former executive says he is innocent of all charges and that he is the victim of a boardroom conspiracy to oust him.
In an emotional interview with the BBC, Ms Ghosn claimed Japanese authorities had attempted to make make her “sound like this conniving woman”.
“I think they wanted to intimidate and humiliate us,” she said. She recalled being followed around the apartment, even into the shower room. “This woman even handed me the towel.”
Ms Ghosn added: “The lawyers told me that anything I say could hurt him in the trial, so to keep my mouth shut. But I want my husband back. I want him with me. I know he is innocent.”
Ms Ghosn said she had not spoken to her husband since he was re-arrested on 4 April before being released on bail three weeks later.
“They told him one of the bail conditions, the restrictions, is he isn't allowed to speak to me or talk to me, which I find inhumane,” she said.
“All of this could have been dealt with internally within the company. This didn't need to go this far and on top of it my husband is innocent and time will prove the truth.”
The case has put Japan’s justice system under the spotlight. Prosecutors in the country secure a 99 per cent conviction rate and human rights campaigners claim that police rely on coercion and long periods of detention in order to secure confessions.
