Citizens' Square

Qin Yongmin (秦永敏) is one of the co-founders of the China Democracy Party. He has been closely monitored by authorities since his November 2010 release from prison after serving 12 years for subversion of state power. In this notice, Qin writes that he was summoned to speak with Secretary Guan of the Wuhan Municipal Party Politics and Law Committee. During their meeting, Secretary Guan told Qin that the government is prepared to assist with Qin's basic living necessities. Secretary Guan also gave him a set of books to read.

On April 10, 2012, Xicheng District People’s Court of Beijing sentenced Beijing-based disabled rights defender Ni Yulan (倪玉兰) to two years and six months in prison for “picking quarrels and provoking troubles” and six months in prison with a fine of 1,000 yuan ($159) for “fraud.” The court ordered Ni to serve both sentences concurrently over a period of two years and eight months. Her husband, Dong Jiqin (董继勤), was also sentenced to two years in prison for “picking quarrels and provoking troubles.” 

Li Tiantian (李天天), a former lawyer from Shanghai, has suffered continuous harassment by the authorities since she began participating in rights defense activities and publishing articles in 2009. Li made an online appeal in support of the Jasmine Revolution in February 2011, and since then was detained for 95 days and forced to leave Shanghai on six occasions. She has since abandoned her profession as lawyer. Li writes in the article that she feels that the rule of law in China is little more than window dressing.

Veteran dissident Qin Yongmin (秦永敏) was administratively detained for 10 days during the 2012 NPC/CPPCC Sessions by the Qingshan District Public Security Bureau in Wuhan, Hubei; he was then illegally detained an additional five days. Qin was illegally deprived of his right to meet with his family or contact those outside while he was detained. In this article on his experience, Qin writes that he has been detained 17 times since the beginning of 2012, resulting in a significant loss of property and severe physical and mental exhaustion.

[Forced Eviction Case] In this public statement, Ye Guoqiang detailed his grievances against various authorities resulting from the forcible eviction of the Ye family from their home in Beijing in May 2003 to make way for Olympics-related construction. This eviction of the members from three generations rendered them homeless because the compensation they received was not enough to buy a new home. Later appeals for additional compensation were unsuccessful, and Ye Guoqiang, out of frustration, attempted suicide by jumping from a bridge near Tiananmen Square on National Day in October 2003. He was later sentenced to two years in prison after a secret trial.

[Zhu Yufu] In the statement (in Chinese), the Beijing-based dissident Zha Jianguo denounced the heavy prison term given to Zhu Yufu, the Zhejiang based dissident who was sentenced to seven years in prison and three years of deprivation of political rights for “inciting subversion of state power.” Zha cited a saying attributed to Alexander Dubček, the Czech reformist leader during Prague Spring: “They may crush the flowers, but they can’t stop the spring.”

[Huangyang Village Wheat Subsidies] Instead of receiving the full sums of the wheat-growing government subsidies due them, the villagers of Huangyang were told that portions of the subsidies went to the Shangdian Township government as payments for their irrigation fees. The villagers challenge the legality of the irrigation fees, and request open government information from the relevant government departments at the township, city and central levels.

[Zhang Hengyin, Sinopec Group] Zhang used his real name to report to Sinopec Group’s discipline inspection commission the corrupt actions of Nie Sizhi, a unit manager at the Fushun Petroleum Chemical Company, a Sinopec’s subsidiary. In 1996, Zhang was detained by the company’s public security officers and was crippled during an interrogation aimed at extorting a confession from him through torture. For the past fifteen years, Zhang has demanded an investigation into the criminal responsibility of public security officers involved in the case, but his pursuit has yielded no results whatsoever.

[Ni Rong] The “Strike-Hard” campaign launched by the central government in the early 1980s led to the imprisonment of many innocent people. Fujian citizen Ni Rong was detained at the scene of an arrest of a thief. He spent four days in intensive care after being tortured. He was not allowed to hire a lawyer. The court of Yong’an County (now Yong’an City), Fujian Province, tried him in secret proceedings that lasted for only two or three minutes, heard by a “judge” who was in fact a manager from a food service company. Ni was sentenced to eight years for robbery. On December 4, 1983, he was sent to Siying coal mine in Songmin County, Yunnan Province, to serve his sentence. Because he refused to admit guilt and continued to appeal the judgment, Ni received no deduction from his sentence, and finished serving his time on August 12, 1991.

[Qin Yongmin and Hu Shigen] Xu Yonghai (徐永海), a Beijing rights defender, describes the ordeal of two democracy activists who appealed for aid on behalf of Wang Guoqi, a Beijing democracy activist (who was imprisoned for 12 years) who was hospitalized: Qin Yongmin, from Wuhan, who also served 12 years in prison, was administratively detained for ten days, and Hu Shigen, from Beijing, who was imprisoned for 16 years, was struck by an unidentified motorcycle. Xu says that, as a Christian, he would use the love that comes from God to forgive the perpetrators and pray for Qin and Hu.