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The Li Peng lawsuit & universal jurisdiction over violations of rights

Tong Shidong & Liao Shihua

CDP PERSECUTION CONTINUES

Rebiya Kadeer , once celebrated by the Chinese government as a model Uighur businesswoman, is now serving an eight year prison term for “illegally passing intelligence outside of China.” Kadeer, 54, was detained on August 11, 1999, on her way to meet a US Congressional Research Service delegation...

Led by Ding Zilin, Zhang Xianling and Su Bingxian, a group of 110 June Fourth victims and family members in China has issued a statement entitled, “A Declaration on the U.S. Federal Court’s Acceptance of the Lawsuit Brought by June Fourth Victims Against Li Peng for Crimes Against Humanity.” (Full...

Li Peng, the Premier of China at the time of the Tiananmen protests and massacre in 1989 was served this morning with a U.S. federal lawsuit alleging massive human rights violations. The action was brought forward by Liming Zhang, an eyewitness to the bloodshed whose sister was shot dead by martial...

A group of 110 family members of those killed and wounded in the June 4 Massacre have demanded that the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) cancel an invitation to former Chinese Premier Li Peng to participate in the Conference of Presiding Officers of National Parliaments. In an open letter to IPU...

Chinese state security authorities have shut down the New Culture Forum website for posting "reactionary content." The site, which is the first China-based site started by veteran democracy activists, is run by a group of dissidents in Shandong Province. Authorities have begun a manhunt for the...

As we go to press, in many parts of the globe former dictators who many thought could never be held accountable for the crimes they committed against the people they ruled are facing prosecution. The Chilean judiciary has just revoked the immunity from prosecution former president Augusto Pinochet...

Experiments in governance Many claims are made about the potential impact on China’s democratization of the election of village committees there. Cynics assert that these elections are nothing but show. Anne F. Thurston looks at the reality on the ground, including how village committees fit into...

Journalists and aid workers have documented the plight of escapees from North Korea who have taken shelter in northeastern China. These vulnerable people are increasingly being sent back to the country they fled, where they are believed to face torture, ill-treatment, imprisonment and even...

Lois Wheeler Snow describes her experiences during her recent visit to Beijing and explains why she has become an ardent supporter of the Tiananmen Mothers’ campaign for justice.

China ignores international law in its treatment of North Korean refugees Beijing’s attitudes towards human rights have impacts beyond China’s borders. James D. Seymour writes of one case in which disregard for its obligations to protect the rights of refugees’ results in their being sent to face...

Inadequate official response allows torture to continue unchecked

NEEDED: A bill of rights for the trade regime Robert A. Senser Three cheers for Sharon K. Hom’s article, “Playing by whose rules and for what ends?” in the Spring 2000 issue of China Rights Forum. To her credit, she raises basic questions about the values and goals of the World Trade Organization (...

ASSAULT ON FALUNGONG

Cultural revolution researcher detained and released

Eleven years after the June Fourth 1989 Massacre (See "Report" session at our website), Ding Zilin and the Tiananmen Mothers are appealing for global support in their campaign for accountability by taking their cause to cyberspace and by allying with regional and international groups against...

On May 24, a letter signed by 108 family members of victims of the June Fourth 1989 Massacre was sent to China’s top prosecutorial body demanding the response to the petition they submitted at this time last year to which they are entitled under Chinese law. The letter, which is translated in full...

Human Rights in China (HRIC) expresses extreme disappointment in the failure of the U.N. Commission on Human Rights to go forward with a resolution criticizing China’s human rights record today.

Human Rights in China (HRIC) is outraged by the Chinese government’s continued persecution of Ding Zilin and victims of the June 4, 1989 Beijing Massacre. On April 1, 2000, Lois Wheeler Snow, the 79-year-old widow of noted sinologist Edgar Snow, was barred from visiting Ding Zilin in her Beijing...

Human Rights in China (HRIC) will send a delegation to Geneva for the Commission on Human Rights from March 28 to April 14. HRIC Director Xiao Qiang and U.N. Liaison B?trice Laroche will be available for interviews to discuss the human rights situation in China. They can be reached at: Hotel Mon...

Ding Zilin issues protest letter to Chinese leaders, condemning the persecution of Lu Wenhe and his elderly father. Lu was prevented from delivering over $25,000 in humanitarian assistance funds to Ding and Tiananmen victims, and was forced to sign over the funds to State Security authorities. Lu’s...

Human Rights in China (HRIC) welcomes the decision by the U.S. government to introduce a resolution censuring China’s human rights situation at the U.N. Commission on Human Rights in Geneva this March.

On Thursday, December 9, Human Rights in China (HRIC) received a Defenders' Day Award from the International League for Human Rights , a non-governmental organization (NGO) devoted to strengthening international human rights institutions.

Human Rights in China (HRIC) held its annual board meeting on November 5, electing prominent astrophysicist Fang Lizhi and seasoned human rights advocate Robert L. Bernstein as co-chairs of the board of directors. The meeting - which marked HRIC’s first gathering of directors in the organization’s...

Human Rights in China calls on President Jiang Zemin and his foreign counterparts to put human rights at the forefront of bilateral discussions during the Chinese leader’s six-nation tour. Jiang’s visit to the United Kingdom, France, Portugal, Morocco, Algeria and Saudi Arabia provides a valuable...

Fortune magazine’s 1999 Global Forum opened in Shanghai today, with the issue of human rights glaringly absent from the agenda. The omission occurs despite Human Rights in China’s repeated appeals to Fortune editors, Time Warner executives and business leaders who are attending the conference. As...

In the latest of a series of trials which represent egregious violations of international human rights standards, an abuse of the law and a slap in the face to the international community, the Chinese government sentenced dissident Liu Xianbin to 13 years in prison, the harshest sentence meted out...

A group of 105 victims and family members of those killed in the 1989 crackdown have submitted a legal petition to the Supreme People’s Procuratorate (China’s prosecutor general) demanding that it conduct a criminal investigation into the June Fourth Massacre and bring prosecutions against those...

A joint press release from Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Center and Human Rights in China

Human Rights in China welcomes the decision today by the U.S. government to introduce a resolution on China’s human rights situation at the U.N. Commission on Human Rights.

To : Delegates of the National People's Congress Re: Proposals for making human rights protections a key focus of the upcoming session

Liu Nianchun, veteran democracy and labor activist, was released on medical parole today and exiled to the United States. His release comes after more than one year in incommunicado detention, over two years of Reeducation Through Labor, and protracted mistreatment. Human Rights in China welcomes...

Human Rights in China condemns the Chinese government's resort to the notion of "state security" as a tool of political repression. Thousands of peaceful democracy and religious activists remain behind bars in China today. The repeated use of "state security" as a political weapon to silence...