Refugee Review Tribunal AUSTRALIA
RRT RESEARCH RESPONSE
Research Response Number: CHN34225 Country: China Date: 23 December 2008
Keywords: China – Monitoring of international telephone calls – Detention of protest leaders – Torture by suspension – Staged suicide – Forced signing of agreements by detainees
This response was prepared by the Research & Information Services Section of the Refugee Review Tribunal (RRT) after researching publicly accessible information currently available to the RRT within time constraints. This response is not, and does not purport to be, conclusive as to the merit of any particular claim to refugee status or asylum. This research response may not, under any circumstance, be cited in a decision or any other document. Anyone wishing to use this information may only cite the primary source material contained herein.
Questions 1. Do the authorities in China listen in on the phone calls of citizens? 2. Is it likely that an individual would be arrested and detained for protesting to a local government official? 3. Is it likely that an individual who sent a letter of petition and immediately departed the country would face disciplinary action by the authorities if they returned to China? 4. Please provide any information about detainees having their hands tied behind their backs while being suspended above the floor? 5. Is there any information about detainees being threatened with having their suicide staged by the authorities? 6. Is it common for the authorities to have detainees sign agreements prior to their release from detention? 7. Is it common for the authorities to give a detainee a bus ticket to travel home?
RESPONSE
1. Do the authorities in China listen in on the phone calls of citizens?
Little information was found on whether Chinese authorities monitor international telephone calls into China. Sources do confirm that police monitor domestic telephone calls, without specifying in great detail which individuals are put under this form of surveillance. The US State Department in its current Country Reports on Human Rights Practices on China states that ―Former political prisoners and their families frequently were subjected to police surveillance, telephone wiretaps…During the year authorities monitored telephone
conversations, facsimile transmissions, e-mail, text messaging, and Internet communications. Authorities also opened and censored domestic and international mail…Some citizens were under heavy surveillance and routinely had their telephone calls monitored or telephone service disrupted‖ (US Department of State 2008, Country Reports on Human Rights Practices 2007 – China, 11 March, Section 1f: ‗Arbitrary Interference with Privacy, Family, Home, or Correspondence‘ – Attachment 1).
Research Response CHN31495 of April 2007 also sought information on Chinese monitoring of international telephone calls. It found only brief references to the Chinese monitoring of international telephones calls in, for example, a 2004 Human Rights Watch report on forced evictions. This response also examined the Chinese government‘s so called ―Golden Shield‖ system intended to monitor its citizen, with reports indicating that part of this system is being aimed at the automated surveillance of telephone conversations (see question one of RRT Country Research 2007, Research Response CHN31495, 5 April – Attachment 2; for a reference to monitoring of international telephones, see Human Rights Watch 2004, Demolished: Forced evictions and the Tenants’ Rights Movement in China, March, Vol. 16, No. 4(C), p. 4 – Attachment 3).
2. Is it likely that an individual would be arrested and detained for protesting to a local government official?
According to the sources provided below, it is not uncommon for those who lead protests and demonstrations against Chinese government authorities to be detained and/or arrested. One example was also found of worker representatives being arrested during protests over government inaction on the misappropriation of funds after a factory bankruptcy.
According to Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade advice dated 19 August 2005, ―Authorities often detain, without proceedings to formal arrest, the leaders of public demonstrations and sometimes detain those who are robust in making complaints to the authorities‖ (Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade 2005, DFAT Report 399: RRT Information Request: CHN17444, 19 August – Attachment 4). A similar conclusion is reached by Kevin O‘Brien and Lianjiang Li, in their Rightful Resistance in Rural China:
…from imperial days to the present, protest leaders have always paid the highest price when collective action backfired, while followers have been protected by their numbers, their relative anonymity, and the authorities fear of alienating a broad swath of the population. In fact, a common outcome has been arrest and imprisonment of ringleaders followed by concessions on the subject of the protestors demands (O‘Brien, K.J & Li, L. 2006, Rightful Resistance in Rural China, Cambridge University Press, New York, p. 87 – Attachment 5).
Lianjiang Li has also written elsewhere that ―Numerous peaceful petitioners, especially leaders of collective petitioning, have experienced harsh crackdowns over the past two decades‖ (Li, L. 2006, ‗Driven to Protest: China‘s Rural Unrest‘, Current History website, 14 August, p.253 http://www.currenthistory.com/org_pdf_files/105/692/105_692_250.pdf – Accessed 11 October 2007 – Attachment 6).
Thomas Lum in a 2006 report for the US Congressional Research Service, Social Unrest in China, includes three examples of the arrest of protest leaders involved in village demonstrations in Guangdong and Zhejiang provinces (pp.3-5). The author goes on to describe the general pattern in government reactions to protests:
Experts have noted a pattern whereby government authorities allow demonstrations to grow, and even publicly sympathize with protesters, while taking time to identify group leaders. Arrests of activists often take place only after some efforts have been made to mollify aggrieved individuals by meeting some of their demands. According to reports, public security agents typically use both torture and rewards to extract expressions of wrongdoing or guilt and to pit activists and neighbors against each other. Scare tactics — the use of arbitrary detention and the employ of untrained security agents (―hired thugs‖) to beat up protest leaders — help to quell further protest activity. When demonstrations get out of hand, the government strictly controls reporting of them, although in many cases, news leaks through the Internet. News of events in Dongzhou spread, despite a blackout on media coverage, through the use of disguised language on the Internet, smaller bulletin board sites, and access to English and overseas Chinese websites.
… Some analysts argue that the PRC government‘s common response to mass demonstrations, which is to appease protesters, punish organizers, and do little about underlying causes — also known as ―buying stability‖ — encourages civil disobedience as the only effective means of winning redress (Lum, T. 2006, Social Unrest in China, US Congressional Research Service, 8 May, pp. 8-10 http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/rl33416.pdf – Accessed 12 December 2006 – Attachment 7).
An article dated July 2003 in The China Labour Bulletin describes the detention and arrest of worker representatives during demonstrations following alleged malpractice and misappropriation of funds that led to the bankruptcy of a factory in Liaoyang. Workers in this instance were also protesting ―against retrenchment or long-standing arrears of wages, pensions‖. The article provides useful information on why the protests occurred and how they were dealt with by the local government authorities:
On 11 March 2002, several thousand workers from the Liaoyang Ferro-Alloy Factory in Liaoning Province marched in Democracy Road, the main street of Liaoyang City, to the headquarters of the city government. They were demanding government action to investigate the malpractice and misappropriation of funds that had led to the bankruptcy of their factory. Several thousand more workers from other factories who held similar grievances soon joined the Ferro-Alloy workers‘ demonstration. The workers, many of whom were in their fifties and older, were all protesting against retrenchment or long-standing arrears of wages, pensions and other basic living subsidies. The Ferro-Alloy workers were unusually well organized and had a core of representatives who were prepared to negotiate with government officials. Six days into the daily street demonstrations, by now involving over 10,000 workers, the Liaoyang police detained several of the workers’ representatives. These arrests triggered more demonstrations by even greater numbers of workers, who now demanded the release of their representatives as well. On 18 March, 30,000 workers were reported by the foreign press to have marched in the streets of Liaoyang, protesting against retrenchment, arrears and the recent police arrests.
…In Liaoyang, the policy pendulum swung between attempts to show a degree of latitude and tolerance towards the workers and the more hard-line tactics of police intimidation and repression. From the outset, a continuous stand-off between the local government and the protestors emerged, marked by numerous and regular street demonstrations led by the Ferro- Alloy workers and aimed at securing both their original demands and the release of their arrested representatives. For their part, the Liaoyang authorities tried for over a year to end the workers‘ protest movement through a combination of procrastination, false promises and apparent pacification, and crude attempts to divide and isolate the workers‘ leaders.
Predictably enough, the final outcome of this process was a resort by the local government to the time-honoured Chinese Government practice of legally branding the movement‘s leaders
as being ―dangerous elements‖ who posed a severe threat to social ―stability and unity.‖ Thus, on 9 May 2003, following their trial on trumped-up charges of “subversion” in January 2003, and fourteen months after their initial detention, two of the principal leaders of the Liaoyang demonstrations, Yao Fuxin and Xiao Yunliang, were sentenced by the city’s judicial authorities to seven and four years’ imprisonment respectively. On 27 June 2003, almost inevitably, despite the best efforts of their lawyers and families, both Yao Fuxin and Xiao Yunliang‘s appeals were rejected without review or retrial.
Harsh and unjust though these prison terms undoubtedly were, they would most likely have been substantially longer had the Liaoyang workers not continued to publicly protest in their thousands for the release of Yao and Xiao during the course of 2002, and if the local labour protests as a whole had not continued to figure so prominently in the pages of the international news media over the same period (‗The Liaoyang Protest Movement of 2002-03, and the Arrest, Trial and Sentencing of the ―Liaoyang Two‖‘ 2003, China Labour Bulletin, July http://www.china- labour.org.hk/public/contents/article?revision%5fid=18683&item%5fid=2938 – Accessed 5 October 2006 – Attachment 8).
3. Is it likely that an individual who sent a letter of petition and immediately departed the country would face disciplinary action by the authorities if they returned to China?
Writing letters of petition is a legal and formal means of addressing grievances in China. According to Thomas Bernstein of Colombia University, legal efforts to protest against a grievance include petitioning higher levels of government through the various Letters and Visits offices. Part of this process was collective petitioning (jiti shangfang), which was ―strongly discouraged but tolerated‖ (Bernstein, Thomas P. 2004, ‗Unrest in Rural China: A 2003 Assessment‘, eScholarship Repository, University of California, p.2 http://repositories.cdlib.org/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1043&context=csd – Accessed 18 July 2006 – Attachment 9). Human Rights Watch has explained more fully that:
Under the petitioning system, citizens unsatisfied with the decisions handed down by local officials or local courts may write letters of complaint or appear in person at special petition bureaus throughout the country. If petitioners are unsatisfied with the response to a petition they have the right to continue up the chain of petition bureaus all the way from the village level to the township, county, provincial, and national levels (Human Rights Watch 2005, “We Could Disappear At Any Time”: Retaliation and Abuses Against Chinese Petitioners, December, Vol. 17, No. 11(C), pp.3-4 – Attachment 10).
And:
In essence, the petitioning system functions as a general complaints system for complaints about any government misdeed, ranging from minor bureaucratic infractions to official corruption and police torture. Petitioners submit statements describing their complaints, and petitions offices are supposed to review the complaints, investigate the cases, and issue a letter about the matter. In some cases, a petitions office may transfer the case to a different government agency.
In theory, the petitioning system establishes a mechanism for independent review of local government. In practice, the petitioning system is overwhelmed by the quantity of complaints, while officials often have a disincentive to process complaints about their misdeeds or those of their colleagues (Human Rights Watch 2005, “We Could Disappear At Any Time”: Retaliation and Abuses Against Chinese Petitioners,
December, Vol. 17, No. 11(C), p.17 – Attachment 10).
A survey cited by Human Rights Watch indicates that petitioners may visit as many as eighteen different bureaus in Beijing, for example, including the National Bureau of Letters and Visits, the State Council, the Supreme Court, the Communist Party Central Disciplinary Commission, the Public Security Bureau, the Supreme People‘s Procuratorate, the National Bureau of Land Resources, the Agriculture Bureau, and the Civil Administration Bureau (Human Rights Watch 2005, “We Could Disappear At Any Time”: Retaliation and Abuses Against Chinese Petitioners, December, Vol. 17, No. 11(C), p.19 – Attachment 10).
Treatment of Petitioners in China
The treatment of petitioners in China is examined in Research Response CHN30369 of July 2006 (see question two of RRT Country Research, Research Response CHN30369, 26 July – Attachment 11). This refers to the December 2005 Human Rights Watch major report on the petitioning system and the treatment of petitioners: “We Could Disappear At Any Time”: Retaliation and Abuses Against Chinese Petitioners, December, Vol. 17, No. 11(C) – Attachment 10. Human Rights Watch noted that local authorities may see petitioners as a threat. The petitioners draw negative attention to their home province and are a threat to the financial well-being of local officials. Human Rights Watch reported the worst aspect of the petitioning system is that many petitioners experience retaliation including beatings, intimidation and kidnapping. Much of the violence emanates from local officials attempting to stop local residents from going to Beijing. Petitioners may be forced to return to their home province which ―often exposes them to grave dangers‖ (Human Rights Watch 2005, “We Could Disappear At Any Time”: Retaliation and Abuses Against Chinese Petitioners, December, Vol. 17, No. 11(C), pp.5-7 – Attachment 10).
Thomas Bernstein concludes that petition leaders were frequently involved in clashes with the authorities:
Violence also erupted in connection with collective petitioning. When groups of villagers visited county authorities to seek relief, officials might refuse to meet with their leaders, fop them off with empty, placating promises of investigations, or simply pass the buck by sending them to other offices. In such cases, anger might be publicly voiced, and more villagers might arrive to reinforce their vanguard. Public Security officials might then order the group to disperse and violence would ensue.
Leaders. Leaders of collective protests came from three groups: respected villagers who did not hold office, to a lesser extent from among village cadres and Party members, and also, perhaps increasingly so, from elected village officials. With regard to the first, in early 2000, the internal edition of a popular journal, Banyuetan, gave this introduction to a 22- page report on and analysis of informal leaders, called ―peasant heroes,‖ in Hunan:
In recent years, in some villages where cadre-mass relations were tense, ―peasant leaders‖ have appeared. Under their leadership, organization, and slogans, peasants engage in collective petitioning, accuse cadres, even surround and attack basic-level Party and government organs. What are they, heroes or troublemakers? Where does their ―magic power‖ come from?
Also called ―burden reduction representatives‖ (jianfu daibiao) or ―collective petitioning representatives‖ (jiti shangfang daibiao), or ―representatives of peasant
interests‖ (nongmin liyi daibiao ren), such leaders had a record of outspoken advocacy on behalf of peasants. They remonstrated with township officials, and, when this didn‘t work – township Party and government had the greatest interest in extracting peasants funds – they led groups to petition higher levels, often all the way to Beijing in order to make their case. They frequently were involved in clashes with the authorities (Bernstein, Thomas P. 2004, ‗Unrest in Rural China: A 2003 Assessment‘, eScholarship Repository, University of California, p.7 http://repositories.cdlib.org/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1043&context=csd – Accessed 18 July 2006 – Attachment 9).
Returnees:
Little information is available on the situation faced by returnees to China, and none was found on returnees who have written petition letters. Nonetheless, given the above information on the treatment of protest leaders and petitioners it is possible that a returnee who had written a petition letter could be considered by authorities to fall within the category of political dissident. (See, for example, the report in Attachment 8 above, where worker representatives were labeled by the Chinese Government as being ―dangerous elements‖ who posed a severe threat to social ―stability and unity.‖) Recent advice from DFAT (March 2007) comments on what might happen on return to a failed asylum seeker believed by the Chinese to be a member of this group. This is provided below:
R.2. In terms of the possible treatment the person might receive on return to China, it is not particularly important how the person comes to the attention of Chinese authorities. As advised in reftel, it is not possible to comment definitively on how Chinese authorities would treat returnees to China who were failed asylum seekers. If Chinese authorities believed them to be a member of one of these groups (Falun Gong, underground church, political dissidents), it would be likely that authorities would interview them and might keep them under surveillance or detain them for a short period. Authorities may record the failed asylum attempt in the person‘s dossier (―dang an‖), which could impede the person‘s attempts to obtain employment (particularly government employment) or engage in further education. If the person was a high-profile activist in Australia (for example a prominent Falun Gong leader, or someone known for publicly criticising the Chinese leadership) it is likely that the authorities would treat them more severely (longer-term surveillance, administrative detention) than if the person was a low-profile member of one of these groups (DIAC Country Information Service 2007, Country Information Report No. CHN8980 – CIS Request CHN8980: China: Publication of client details, (sourced from DFAT advice of 20 March 2007), 22 March – Attachment 12).
4. Please provide any information about detainees having their hands tied behind their backs while being suspended above the floor?
The International Society for Human Rights (ISHR), a collective of independent non- governmental human rights organisations, lists the following two torture methods similar to that described above, in its list of common methods of torture and abuse in the People‘s Republic of China:
Lifting of arms twisted behind the back
The arms of the victim are twisted behind the back and bound with a thin rope. The arms of the victim are then pulled upwards, thus becoming overstretched and often dislocated. The rope cuts into the victim‘s flesh. The pain is so severe that the victim sometimes loses control over their bladder. According to reports, there have been cases of death when victims have been abused repeatedly in this way.
Hanging by the hands (―to hang up a cage‖)
The hands of the victim are bound. The police then pull the hands of the victim over the victim‘s head and hang them up until their feet no longer touch the ground. A variation of this method is to hang the victim from a tree or pole using handcuffs (‗Common methods of torture and abuse in the People‘s Republic of China‘ (undated), International Society for Human Rights website http://www.ishr.org/?id=1047 – Accessed 19 December 2008 – Attachment 13).
A United Nations report published in 2006 on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishments in China does include ―suspension from overhead fixtures with handcuffs‖ in its list of alleged methods of torture:
The methods of torture alleged include, among others: beatings with sticks and batons; use of electric shock batons; cigarette burns; hooding/blindfolding; guard-instructed or permitted beatings by fellow prisoners; use of handcuffs or ankle fetters for extended periods (including in solitary confinement or secure holding areas); submersion in pits of water or sewage; exposure to conditions of extreme heat or cold; being forced to maintain uncomfortable positions, such as sitting, squatting, lying down, or standing for long periods of time, sometimes with objects held under arms; deprivation of sleep, food or water; prolonged solitary confinement; denial of medical treatment and medication; hard labour; and suspension from overhead fixtures with handcuffs. In several cases, the techniques employed have been given particular terminologies, such as the ―tiger bench‖, where one is forced to sit motionless on a tiny stool a few centimeters off the ground; ―reversing an
airplane‖, where one is forced to bend over while holding legs straight, feet close together and arms lifted high; or ―exhausting an eagle‖, where one is forced to stand on a tall stool and subjected to beatings until exhaustion. Several of these forms of torture have been corroborated by studies carried out by Chinese academics. On the basis of the information he received during his mission, the Special Rapporteur confirms that many of these methods of torture have been used in China (United Nations Commission on Human Rights 2006, Civil and Political Rights, including the Question of Torture and Detention – Report of the Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, Manfred Nowak, Mission to China, E/CN.4/2006/6/Add.6, 10 March, p. 14 – Attachment 14).
5. Is there any information about detainees being threatened with having their suicide staged by the authorities?
There are reports that Chinese police use the threat that a detainee‘s death in custody from ill- treatment will be disguised or reported as a suicide. In November 2007, the Global Journalist website reported on the journalist Qi Chonghua who was arrested after writing on corruption in local administration, displacement of peasants, and environment problems:
Qi Chonghua, a detained journalist in Tengzhou, a city in the eastern province of Shandong, was interrogated and beaten while in police custody, according to Reporters Without Borders and Committee to Protect Journalist. Qi‘s lawyer told Agence France-Presse: ―The police have slapped him in the face more than 20 times…they told him they could hit him as much as they liked and could disguise his death as suicide.‖ Qi was arrested, with his colleague, Ma Shiping, this June for writing stories on corruption in local administration as well as sensitive topics such as displacement of peasents and environment problems. ―The accusations of extortion are inadmissible as all he did was report on corruption,‖ his wife, Jiao Xia, told AFP. Qi and Ma have no been brought before a judge, so their detention lasts longer than what the law lasts. They are now waiting for trial. Both charges can put them into jail for at least a three-year sentence in China (‗China – Detained journalist beaten in prison‘ 2007, Global Journalist website, November http://www.globaljournalist.org/worldwatch/2007/11/ – Accessed 23 December 2008 – Attachment 15).
Some actual deaths in custody officially reported as suicides are said to have been ‗staged‘. The death of petitioner Li Guofu in prison officially recorded as a suicide, a claim which was questioned by family members was reported on the China Daily website in July 2008:
Three officials in Anhui province have been suspended pending an investigation into the suspicious death of a businessman.
Li Guofu died suddenly in March, and his death was recorded as a suicide. He had petitioned the central government over the abuse of power in his province.
Zhang Zhi‘an, the Party chief of Yingquan district, Fuyang city, was detained on June 5 by Anhui provincial discipline inspection and prosecution authorities, the China Youth Daily newspaper reported yesterday.
Earlier, the Yingquan district‘s chief prosecutor Wang Cheng and anti-corruption chief Zheng Tao were suspended and put under investigation, the newspaper said.
Li had accused Zhang of various abuses of power, which included the construction of a luxury government building designed to look like the White House in the United States.
The China Youth Daily in earlier reports said Li, former head of a real estate development company in Fuyang, had traveled to Beijing several times hoping to bring Zhang to justice for building hotels, a golf course, a racecourse and a government office building on nearly 500 hectares of fertile farmland. Sources close to the local government said the building, which was put into use in 2003, cost at least 30 million yuan ($4.3 million), nearly one-third of the total revenue of Yingquan district.
Li, in his petition, said Zhang had ―put a close friend in charge of the construction and sold the old government office to real estate developers‖.
Early last year, Li told his family that Zhang ―was about to take revenge‖, but he refused to be intimidated and continued his trips to Beijing to petition the government. He apparently hid the real purpose of his trips from his wife, telling her he was buying medicine.
He was detained by the local procuratorate in August last year. He was accused of fabricating official documents and seals, embezzling nearly 1 million yuan in public funds, and making 610,000 yuan in illegal profits by reselling properties.
Li had been under treatment since mid-January at the Fuyang prison hospital for cardiovascular disease and diabetes that caused him to go blind.
Prison workers said he hung himself on March 13, a few hours before he was to meet his lawyer.
Li’s family, however, questioned the claim of suicide. They said they saw bruises on his neck, chest and back. His mouth was tightly shut, a sign that he could not have died by hanging, his son, Li Denghui, said.
Corruption cases involving officials have repeatedly been reported in the eastern provinces and cities, which are witnessing a booming economy.
The Communist Party of China Central Committee on Sunday ordered Party organs at all levels to seriously carry out a new five-year plan which aims at establishing a system to punish and prevent corruption from 2008 to 2012.
The plan also intensifies the supervision of officials in various Party organs and governments. A close watch will be kept on officials‘ incomes, bribery, and interference in the marketplace through the use of their positions (‗3 suspended over dubious suicide‘ 2008, China Daily website, 24 June http://chinadaily.com.cn/language_tips/cdaudio/2008- 06/24/content_6790491.htm – Accessed 23 December 2008 – Attachment 16).
The death of Li Guofu is used as an introduction to an article on the Clear Harmony: Falun Dafa in Europe website titled ‗How many Falun Gong Deaths have been passed off as suicide during the persecution?‘ This article makes reference to the disguised suicide of two Falun Gong practitioners: Mr. Xiong Zhengming from Wanyuan City, Sichuan Province on 2007, and Mr. Bai Heguo, from Guangshan Village, Liutiao Town, Dengta City, Liaoning Province in early 2008 (Zhanxing, L. 2008, ‗How Many Falun Gong Deaths Have Been Passed Off as Suicide During the Persecution?‘, Clear Harmony: Falun Dafa in Europe website, 27 July http://www.clearharmony.net/articles/200807/45442.html – Accessed 23 December 2008 – Attachment 17).
6. Is it common for the authorities to have detainees sign agreements prior to their release from detention?
Reports on the detention and/or arrest of individuals under various circumstances by Chinese authorities do indicate that persons are forced to sign documents agreeing to certain actions. No information was found on the extent of this practice among Chinese law enforcement authorities. The Voice of the Martyrs website reported on 3 December 2008 that authorities ―demanded‖ the President of the Chinese House Church Alliance, Pastor Zhang, sign a Ministry of Civil Affairs statement calling for the elimination of the Chinese House Church Alliance, while detained in Nanyang, Henan province. Others concurrently detained but later released were also ―forced to sign documents‖. Similarly, a September 2008 report on the detention of house church leader Shi Weihan in Beijing states that while in detention he ―reportedly was forced to sign a ―confession‖, convicting him of engaging in the printing and distribution of a large number of what China described as ―illegal‖ publications‖ (‗Authorities crack down on the Chinese House Church Alliance‘ 2008, The Voice of the Martyrs Inc. website, 3 December https://www.persecution.net/cn-2008-12-03.htm – Accessed 22 December 2008 – Attachment 18; ‗Ailing House Church Leader Remains Detained In China‘ 2008, Christian Persecution Info website, source: BosNewsLife Asia Service, 8 September http://www.christianpersecution.info/news/ailing-house-church-leader- remains-detained-in-china-16086/ – Accessed 22 December 2008 – Attachment 19).
Amnesty International UK also referred to the forced signing of an agreement in the case of demonstration organiser Ye Guozhu in September 2008:
Ye Guozhu was forcibly evicted when his home became part of a site for development in preparation for the Olympic Games. He was sentenced to four years‘ imprisonment after he sought permission to organise a demonstration in Beijing with other victims of forced evictions in December 2004.
Ye Guozhu was released on 15 Oct 2008. His family were warned by police at the time to keep news of his release secret, or Ye would be returned to custody.
His brother Ye Quoqiang said that on 29 September Ye Guozhu was forced to sign an agreement accepting compensation for his eviction. He said that Ye Guozhu was threatened with new charges and continued detention if he did not sign, and had been pressured into stating that he did not require a lawyer during his time in custody.
During his four years in prison, Ye Guozhu‘s health has deteriorated. He was forbidden from seeing his elderly mother and father, and his mother died while he was in custody. Ye has been exhausted by his ordeal and is currently resting and receiving medical treatment (‗China: Free human rights defender Ye Guozhu‘ 2008, Amnesty International UK website, 12 December http://www.amnesty.org.uk/actions_details.asp?ActionID=287 – Accessed 22 December 2008 – Attachment 20).
In January 2008 Agence France Presse (AFP) reported on the detention of a ―cyber- dissident‖ in China, Wang Dejia. Wang Dejia‘s wife told AFP that he had been ―forced to sign a pledge‖ to cease writing critically of the government:
China has released a cyber-dissident detained since last month on subversion charges, but only on the condition he cease posting writings critical of the government, his wife told AFP on Wednesday.
Wang Dejia, a critic of China‘s human rights situation, was released on bail last Saturday from a detention center in the picturesque southern city of Guilin, where he had been held since December 13, his wife Wen Zhenyan said.
But he was forced to sign a pledge not to write any more, she told AFP (‗China cyber- dissident freed but muzzled, wife says‘ 2008, Agence France Presse, 16 January – Attachment 21).
7. Is it common for the authorities to give a detainee a bus ticket to travel home?
No information was found on whether or not it is common practice for the Chinese authorities to give a detainee a bus ticket to travel home following a period of detention. The practice does exist in China of released detainees being escorted back to their home province or residence by police or other authorities. Research Response CHN33584 of July 2008 lists instances of Falun Gong practitioners being escorted back from Beijing to various provinces around 2000; and further examples of dissidents/activists, including petitioners, being detained and then ―deported‖ or escorted back to their place of residence between 2003 and 2008 (see question five of RRT Research & Information 2008, Research Response CHN33584, 31 July – Attachment 22). This response includes the following 2003 Agence France Presse article involving individuals who protested in Beijing over a property dispute in Shanghai. Some protestors were ―released because they signed a confession‖ and ―escorted back to Shanghai‖:
Police have released a handful of protestors who were detained last week for their role in a simmering property dispute in Shanghai, but dozens more remain in custody with some on hunger strike, residents said Monday.
―It‘s illegal for them to keep us here and I said that I wanted a lawyer. I was then released,‖ one protestor, Chen Jun, told AFP.
Police released seven or eight people after some requested legal council and others signed confessions, several people involved in the bitter real estate feud said.
“They were released because they signed a confession saying it was wrong of them to go to Beijing, promising they would not go to Beijing for this issue anymore,” said Wang Wenzhen, whose sister is still being held.
Some 85 people were detained by police on September 30 in Beijing ahead of China‘s October 1 National Day when they intended to petition authorities over the massive urban redevelopment projects.
According to China‘s constitution, citizens have the right of assembly and freedom of expression but authorities consistently arrest anyone who dares to publically air grievances.
After being escorted back to Shanghai, the demonstrators were to be held for 15 days and undergo training sessions to correct their thinking, according to Human Rights in China (HRIC) (‗Chinese police release Shanghai property protestors‘ 2003, Agence France Presse, 6 October – Attachment 23).
List of Sources Consulted
Internet Sources:
Non-Government Organisations International Society for Human Rights website http://www.ishr.org/ Amnesty International UK website http://www.amnesty.org.uk/ Clear Harmony: Falun Dafa in Europe website http://www.clearharmony.net/ Region Specific Links China Daily website http://chinadaily.com.cn/ Topic Specific Links Global Journalist website http://www.globaljournalist.org Search Engines Google search engine http://www.google.com.au/
Databases:
FACTIVA (news database) BACIS (DIAC Country Information database) REFINFO (IRBDC (Canada) Country Information database) ISYS (RRT Research & Information database, including Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, US Department of State Reports) RRT Library Catalogue
List of Attachments
1. US Department of State 2008, Country Reports on Human Rights Practices 2007 – China, 11 March.
2. RRT Country Research 2007, Research Response CHN31495, 5 April.
3. Human Rights Watch 2004, Demolished: Forced evictions and the Tenants’ Rights Movement in China, March, Vol. 16, No. 4(C).
4. Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade 2005, DFAT Report 399: RRT Information Request: CHN17444, 19 August.
5. O‘Brien, K.J & Li, L. 2006, Rightful Resistance in Rural China, Cambridge University Press, New York. (MRT-RRT Library Sydney)
6. Li, L. 2006, ‗Driven to Protest: China‘s Rural Unrest‘, Current History website, 14 August http://www.currenthistory.com/org_pdf_files/105/692/105_692_250.pdf – Accessed 11 October 2007.
7. Lum, T. 2006, Social Unrest in China, US Congressional Research Service, 8 May http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/rl33416.pdf – Accessed 12 December 2006.
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23. ‗Chinese police release Shanghai property protestors‘ 2003, Agence France Presse, 6 October. (FACTIVA)