June 12, 2022 Chinese human rights lawyer Tang Jitian (唐吉田) has been detained extralegally since December 10, 2021 by Beijing and Jilin state security under the pretext of “maintaining stability,” while his only daughter, Tang Zhengqi, is in a coma in Japan. We understand that Mr. Tang has recently made repeated requests to the head of the State Security Bureau of Yanji City and the State Security Detachment of Yanbian Prefecture Public Security Bureau to end his inhumane and illegal detention. However, they all refused, saying that they needed to ask for instructions and consent from the State Security Bureau of the Jilin Provincial Public Security Department, the Beijing Public Security Bureau, and the Ministry of Public Security. Mr. Tang has explained to the these […]

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 represented Li Wei, a New Citizen Movement activist charged with “gathering a crowd to disrupt public order” for publicly calling for officials to disclose assets; petitioners in Wuxi charged with “picking quarrels;” dissident Wang Jian in Nanjing; and a number of Falun Gong practitioners. His representation of gender discrimination and employment discrimination over the years stands out among lawyers, and his clients included a female chef in Guangdong and a HIV […]

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 information is as follows:ID number: 61032219[Redacted].Mailing address:  Shenzhen, Guangdong Province [Redacted]cccc.Phone #: 18565718426. A brief description of the case From January 12 to January 22, 2020, Chang Weiping was placed under Residential Surveillance at a Designated Location (RSDL) by the Baoji High-Tech Development Zone Public Security Bureau branch. He was suspected of “inciting subversion of state power” due to having participated in the “December 26 Xiamen gathering” (hereafter the […]

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 had long wanted to meet. Whether by a heartfelt wish or divine coincidence, it is such crossing of paths, accidental or planned, that fill life with richness. On this trip, I was to go to Linshu County Detention Center in Linyi City to meet Ding Jiaxi (丁家喜). Having been accused of subverting state power, he has been detained for more than a […]

Yaxue Cao, March 21, 2018 Continued from The Might of an Ant: the Story of Lawyer Li Baiguang (1 of 2) Rights Movement Spread All Over the Country By 2004, Zhao Yan and Li Baiguang were under constant threat. Fuzhou police told the village deputies that Zhao and Li were criminals, and demanded that the deputies expose the two. The Fujian municipal government also dispatched a special investigation team to the hometowns of Li and Zhao to look into their family backgrounds. A public security official in Fu’an said: “Don’t you worry that Zhao and Li are still on the lam — that’s because it’s not time for their date with the devil just yet. Just wait till that day comes: we’ll grab them, put them […]

Yaxue Cao, March 20, 2018   Li Baiguang (李柏光), a human rights lawyer, died on February 26, 2018, aged 49. Li Baiguang, born on October 1, 1968, was the youngest of seven children in a tiny mountain village household in Jiahe county, Chenzhou, Hunan. His father died when he was seven years old. The family was impoverished. When Li reached school age, his playmates went to school, but he had to stay home another year and help his mother with chores. One day, after he herded the ducks back home, Li went to the school, leant on the window, and saw his friends all studying. He returned home and told his mother through tears: “If you don’t let me go to school, I’ll hack our […]

China Change, published: July 9, 2015   The morning of 10 July, following the news of lawyer Wang Yu (王宇, see Statement below) being disappeared, it has just been reported that lawyer Zhou Shifeng (周世锋律师), director of the Fengrui Law Office in Beijing (北京锋锐律师事务所), was kidnapped this morning and his whereabouts are unknown. Lawyer Liu Xiaoyuan tweeted earlier this morning: “Yesterday evening, Zhou Shifeng went to the Tongzhou District Detention Center to pick up Zhang Miao (张淼). (Zhang, a research assistant for the German publication Die Zeit, was arrested in October in Hong Kong last year during the Umbrella Revolution, and she was released from the detention center last night.) Later, Wang Lin, Zhang Miao, and Zhou Shifeng stayed at the Seven Days Hotel in […]

In an interview with the New York Times in late May when his “probation” ended, China’s most famous artist, Ai Weiwei, recounted the details of his forced disappearance in April, 2011. “The policeman yanked the black hood over Ai Weiwei’s head. It was suffocating. Written in white across the outside was a cryptic phrase: ‘Suspect 1.7.’ At the rear of a white van, one policeman sat on each side of Mr. Ai. …They clutched his arms. Four more men sat in the front rows.” It must be jolting enough to be pulled out of the crowd from the bustling Beijing International Airport. But there was something else that bewildered Ai Weiwei. “‘Until that moment I still had spirit, because it didn’t look real,’” Mr. Ai said. […]