China Change, September 25, 2021 On December 7 and 8, 2019, twenty or so people – more than half of them human rights lawyers and the rest citizen movement enthusiasts – gathered in Xiamen, Fujian Province, for a day-and-half informal gathering. It was a mixed affair of chatting, debate, karaoke, lunch, and dinner, and the topics they touched o [...] Keep reading »

Chen Zijuan, September 19, 2021 Born in 1984, Chang Weiping has been an outstanding member of the younger generation of human rights lawyers in China. Starting in 2014, he has represented human rights defenders in areas of free speech, expression of political dissent, religious freedom, anti-discrimination in the workplace and more. For example, he [...] Keep reading »

Chen Zijuan, August 3, 2021 Dear Ministry of Public Security and Public Security Minister Zhao Kezhi, My name is Chen Zijuan (陈紫娟). I graduated from a certain institute of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing and hold a PhD in microbiology. I am the wife of Chang Weiping (常玮平), who is currently incarcerated. My personal informatio [...] Keep reading »

Li Xiongbing, July 15, 2021 July 13, 2021, a summer day in Beijing. The sun was emerging after a rain shower. I waded through puddles on the road heading for Beijing South Railway Station. It was getting pretty late when the high-speed train arrived in Linyi. Getting off the train, I ran into a former colleague whom I hadn’t seen for years but ha [...] Keep reading »

May 22, 2021 The fifth China Human Rights Lawyers Day will be held virtually on July 9, 2021. The China Human Rights Lawyers Day was created on July 9, 2017 in acknowledgement of the tireless efforts of Chinese human rights lawyers in their struggle for justice and the rule of law. It commemorates the mass arrest of lawyers that occured on July 9, [...] Keep reading »

Andréa Worden, April 21, 2021 There are many reasons why rights-respecting governments should stay far away from Xi Jinping’s Winter Olympics. To name just a few: the Uyghur genocide, the crushing of political and civil freedoms in Hong Kong, the deepening assault on Tibetan culture and religion, the forced erasure of Mongolian and other ethnic [...] Keep reading »

Chen Zijuan, April 14, 2021 Today is Chang Weiping’s 37th birthday. He practiced law in Shaanxi province from 2013 to late 2018, when his license was suspended, as part of China’s continuous disbarment of human rights lawyers in recent years. His career as a lawyer began from defending the New Citizens Movement activists in 2013, and over the n [...] Keep reading »

Shi Minglei, March 8, 2021 On July 22, 2019, three staff members of a Chinese NGO known as “Changcha Funeng” (长沙富能）were arrested; as of today, they have been held by state security agents in Changsha for 596 days without any meaningful information concerning their case. The prosecutors and judges in Changsha have avoided seeing either [...] Keep reading »

Chen Zijuan, February 15, 2021 Dr. Chen Zijuan (陈紫娟) is a biologist working in Shenzhen. This piece was originally published in Chinese on Feb. 6, 2021. — The Editors My husband Chang Weiping (常玮平) is a Chinese human rights lawyer, who has represented clients in cases related to religious freedom, forced demolition and discrimination [...] Keep reading »