li wangyang

Tang Jingling (唐荆陵), a Guangdong lawyer retained by the family of the late labor activist Li Wangyang (李旺阳), was detained for six days, from September 5 to September 10 in Shaoyang, Hunan Province, and in Shaoguan, Guangdong Province. Li’s death on June 6 this year in a hospital room in Shaoyang was declared a suicide by the authorities, but this determination has been questioned by Li’s family and friends.

Following the release of an investigation report by Hunan provincial authorities which confirmed activist Li Wangyang’s (李旺阳) death as suicide, ten lawyers from mainland China and Hong Kong sent an open letter to the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (Chinese only). The lawyers stated in the letter that there were five major questions concerning the death scene inspection and autopsy and held that the police’s handling of Li’s death seriously violated the law. The lawyers urge that the Standing Committee lift the unlawful house arrest of Li’s family, friends, and supporters, and instruct the Ministry of Public Security to set up a joint investigative team to conduct an independent and professional investigation of Li’s death, as well as to make the findings of that investigation public.

Human Rights in China (HRIC) has learned from an informed source that the sister and brother-in-law of Li Wangyang (李旺阳) were taken to a hotel today, June 7, and are being held there by the police. Li Wangyang is a Hunan labor activist who was found dead of purported suicide in a hospital room in Shaoyang, Hunan on June 6.