Citizens' Square

To China's Human Rights Lawyers: The Elite of the Elite, Conscience of Lawyers

If it was said that previously I did my utmost to avoid the circle of human rights lawyers, it would be because of lawyer Li Heping. I really couldn’t stand the police watching the front door of my own home every day; I couldn’t stand my husband being thrown into various police substations when he...

December 10, 2015

Citizens' Square

Access to Justice

709 Families and Supporters

Wang Yu and Bao Longjun in my eyes

I met the beautiful and poised Wang Yu and the simple and honest Bao Longjun in June 2013. I hired lawyers Wang and Bao after receiving a call from Suzhou Huqiu People’s Court concerning the suit against Suzhou Jianxin Construction Group’s project manager, Ding Jianxin, who had destroyed Ge Jueping...

December 6, 2015

Citizens' Square

Access to Justice

709 Families and Supporters

Guo Feixiong’s Appeal to the Guangzhou Municipal Intermediate People’s Court

Rights defense activist Guo Feixiong was sentenced on November 27, 2015 to six years’ imprisonment for “gathering crowds to disrupt order in public places” and “picking quarrels and provoking troubles.” Among the arguments that Guo makes in his appeal is that the trial court, the Tianhe District...

December 4, 2015

Citizens' Square

Access to Justice

Guo Feixiong

Lawyer Yu Wensheng Files Complaint About Police Torture

In his complaint to the Daxing District People’s Court, Beijing, Lawyer Yu Wensheng recounts his torture by two police officers during his 99-day detention. One of his torturers said to him: “I won’t let you die, but I will make you feel you’d rather be dead.” Yu was taken into custody on October...

November 22, 2015

Citizens' Square

Access to Justice

Dong Guangping arrested by Thai police, wife appeals for help

Democracy activist Dong Guangping, from Zhengzhou, Henan province, could not bear the threats and harassment by Chinese police against him and his family, so he took his wife and daughter into exile in Thailand and obtained United Nations refugee protection status. However, on October 28, he was...

October 31, 2015

Citizens' Square

International Human Rights

Lawyer Zheng Xiang’s record of meeting with Guo Hongwei

Lawyer Zheng Xiang met with detained Jilin petitioner Guo Hongwei and learned that the supervising officers unlawfully used restraints such as leg irons and handcuffs, and instigated and condoned other detainees to maltreat him. The lawyer stated that he will file a complaint to investigate such...

October 29, 2015

Citizens' Square

Access to Justice

When Will Liu Sixin and Zhao Wei’s Right to Meet Their Lawyers Be Realized?!

Dr. Liu Sixin and Madam Zhao Wei were two of the individuals detained in the massive “709 crackdown” on lawyers and defenders that began in China on July 9 of this year. On September 17, Wang Lei and Ren Quanniu, the defense lawyers for Liu and Zhao, went to the pre-trial division of Hexi branch of...

September 17, 2015

Citizens' Square

Access to Justice

Searching for Hu Shigen, Part 2

On October 27, lawyer Zheng Xiang once again went to Tianjin’s Hexi Detention Center and finally learned that Hu Shigen’s case is being handled by the Hexi branch of the Tianjin Public Security Bureau. Hu was criminally detained on July 11, and was put under “residential surveillance in a...

October 28, 2015

Citizens' Square

Access to Justice

Searching for Hu Shigen, Part 1

On July 10, 2015, Beijing dissident and Christian Hu Shigen, along with Liu Yongping and Ge Ping, disappeared as they prepared to participate in a church gathering. Nearly 100 days after the family retained a lawyer to report the case to the security authorities, the only answer given by the police...

October 19, 2015

Citizens' Square