By China Change, published: March 31, 2015
In Sichuan, activist Chen Yunfei (陈云飞) has been missing since March 25 after he and 20 or so others “swept” graves of two college students who died in Beijing during the Tiananmen Massacre in June, 1989. The group was in Shuangliu county (双流县) and then Xinjin county (新津县) where were rounded up by police and taken to local police stations for questioning. All have since been released except for Chen Yunfei.
The group on the “sweeping grave” trip. Chen Yunfei, back row, second from right with backpack in the front.
Chen Yunfei’s family has not received any document from the authorities about his status. On March 30, lawyer Ran tong (冉彤), per request of Chen’s relatives, visited the public security bureau and the detention center in Xinjin to ascertain Chen Yunfei’s whereabouts, but the authorities told the lawyer that they “don’t have any information about Chen Yunfei.” The lawyer subsequently announced that Chen was missing.
Some in the group told overseas Chinese media that the police asked them to support the accusation that Chen Yunfei “incited subversion of state power.”
A friend of Chen told Radio Free Asia that, around this time every year, known as Clear and Bright (清明) in Chinese almanac, friends and families would pay homage to the two dead, and they have not had similar incidents in the past.
One of the dead was Xiao Jie (肖杰), a freshman at Renmin University in Beijing in 1989, who was shot dead on June 5th, the day after the massacre, when he crossed street near Tiananmen Square, failing to heed the red military cordon. Another was Wu Guofeng (吴国锋), a junior also at Remin Unversity, who was killed by gun shots in the head but was also bayonetted in the lower abdomen. Professor Ai Xiaoming (艾晓明) wrote about the brutal death of Wu Guofeng and her visit of the Wu family in 2010, accompanied by Chen Yunfei, a college student too in 1989.
Participant Luo Kaiwen (罗开文) told RFA that when the group was rounded up, the police singled out Chen Yunfei. Friends fear that Chen would be mistreated as police brutality is common in their dealing with activists and dissidents.
Sichuan writer Tan Zuoren (谭作人), who was released from prison a year ago after serving a five-year sentence for investigating the collapsed school buildings during the 2008 earthquake, told CHRD that the authorities see Chen Yunfei as a trouble maker and have wanted to find an opportunity to rein him in.
Liberal journalist Xiao Shu (笑蜀) commented on his friend’s disappearance: “He’s someone who will abide by reason only, and how idiotic they have to be to think they can subjugate Chen Yunfei by force.”
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Sources:
http://wqw2010.blogspot.com/2015/03/blog-post_706.html?spref=tw
http://www.rfa.org/mandarin/yataibaodao/renquanfazhi/xl1-03262015105204.html
http://www.64tianwang.com/bencandy.php?fid=9&aid=20165
http://msguancha.com/a/lanmu4/2015/0330/12123.html
http://xgmyd.com/archives/15701
[…] activists were detained, according to the Chinese Human Rights Defenders group. Late last month, another vanished after taking part in traditional rituals to commemorate two students killed in the 1989 crackdown […]
[…] activists were detained, according to the Chinese Human Rights Defenders group. Late last month, another vanished after taking part in traditional rituals to commemorate two students killed in the 1989 crackdown […]
[…] activists were detained, according to the Chinese Human Rights Defenders group. Late last month, another vanished after taking part in traditional rituals to commemorate two students killed in the 1989 crackdown […]