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Beijing cracks down on dissent ahead of Tiananmen anniversary
The Australian - June 3, 2009
Beijing – A protester imprisoned during the Tiananmen Square crackdown has been detained and other Chinese dissidents are under house arrest or tight surveillance ahead of the 20th anniversary of the crushing of pro-democracy protests, activists say.
Civil rights lawyers have also been targeted in a campaign to suppress dissent.
Wu Gaoxing, who was jailed for two years after he demonstrated in 1989 in Zhejiang province as the protests were taking place in Beijing, was taken away on Saturday, activist Chen Longde said yesterday.
Mr Wu had just written an open letter to Chinese President Hu Jintao seeking economic redress for those jailed after the army crackdown on and around Tiananmen Square on June 4, 1989, which killed hundreds and possibly thousands.
Mr Chen, who was jailed for three years and signed the letter along with three other former prisoners, said they wanted the Government to resolve their living problems, which included a lack of health insurance.
"We were also fired from our companies," he said. "For 20 years, they have deprived us of our right to life."
Mr Chen said he and the other signatories had not been bothered by police, and believed Mr Wu had been detained because he wrote the letter.
In Beijing, Ding Zilin, 72, whose son was shot and killed on the evening of June 3, 1989, said she had been asked to leave the Chinese capital ahead of the anniversary.
"But I refused," she said, adding she had been followed when she left her house to buy things to mark the anniversaries of her son's birthday, which would have been yesterday, and his death, today.
In the southwestern province of Guizhou, human rights activist Chen Xi said he had been put under house arrest, and dissidents in the provincial capital were under strict surveillance.
The latest move against dissidents came after Bao Tong – a former aide to late Chinese leader Zhao Ziyang, who was purged for sympathising with pro-democracy protesters – was taken out of Beijing last week.
Qi Zhiyong, who lost a leg after being shot in Tiananmen Square, said he was under house arrest in west Beijing, and had been stopped from going to church on Sunday.
And Jiang Qisheng, who was jailed in 1999 for four years for calling on people to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the crackdown, said police had been stationed at his Beijing home.
Chinese authorities have effectively disbarred leading civil rights lawyers – a group that has done more to hold the Government to account than any other in recent years.
The lawyers described the move as part of a government campaign to prevent them from taking on controversial or high-profile cases.
Lawyer Jiang Tianyong said his 12-month permit was invalid and he was no longer allowed to work. All such licences were due for renewal by May 31. By the close of business that day, his permit, along with those of about 20 other lawyers, had expired without a word from the authorities. (AFP, The Times)
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