Activists promote rights charter despite crackdown (News Feature)

By Bill Smith Dec 8, 2010, 5:28 GMT

Beijing - Thousands of activists have added their names to online petitions supporting Charter '08 since 303 leading scholars, lawyers and dissidents issued the blueprint for democratic reform in December 2008.

Over the past two years, online activists have made the charter a standing topic on Chinese-language social networking websites.

Some activists have risked arrest by introducing Charter '08 to a wider audience, and a few have openly publicized the charter on city streets.

Wang Zang, a rights activist in the south-western city of Guiyang, said he had discussed the charter with people who attended informal rights salons in the city's People's Square.

'The people on the square generally know about this. Some knew about it from the internet, some got material about Charter '08 on the spot, and some were told about it by people who came to the square,' Wang told the German Press Agency dpa by telephone in late November.

Wang said he and other rights activists generally take a back seat in the square, where 72-year-old Mei Chongbiao has regularly discussed rights issues and distributed information on Chinese and world affairs over the last few years.

Charter '08 had acted as a catalyst for the meetings, which sometimes attract more than 100 people on weekend afternoons, Wang said.

In Charter '08, 303 leading dissidents, activists and writers set out their ideals for building a democratic nation and lamented a lack of 'freedom, equality and human rights' under the ruling Communist Party.

Issued on December 10, 2008, to coincide with the international Human Rights Day, the charter was modelled on the Charter '77 written by intellectuals in the former Czechoslovakia.

Dissident writer Liu Xiaobo was sentenced to 11 years in prison for co-organizing the charter. Liu was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize on October 8.

'After the award of the Nobel prize, I feel the square has become more active than ever,' Wang said.

Wang said police constantly monitored the group's activities but usually did not interfere.

But there are limits to the authorities' tolerance of the informal gatherings in Guiyang, the capital of Guizhou province.

Police detained Wang on Tuesday along with at least four other members of the Guizhou Human Rights Forum to prevent them marking Friday's Human Rights Day, which coincides with the award ceremony for the Nobel prize, US-based Radio Free Asia reported.

Wang's mobile phone was switched off on Wednesday.

Earlier this week, Guiyang police reportedly also warned Mei and three friends not to take part in any more activities related to the Nobel prize.

Across China, police have placed many other signatories and supporters of Charter '08 under house arrest or close surveillance since October 8.

On November 16 in the north-western city of Yinchuan, police questioned democracy activist Chen Xiaochang and confiscated his computers, mainly focusing on his posting of Charter '08 on his Facebook account, activist group China Human Right Defenders said.

The police fined Chen 2,000 yuan (300 dollars) and threatened to send him to a 're-education through labour' centre if he continued to download material on Charter '08, the group said.

The group said Beijing-based Liu Shasha disappeared on Tuesday after she and two others went to the home of a fellow activist who was under house arrest.

Liu's mobile phone rang unanswered Wednesday and she did not respond to text messages.

Liu, who was kidnapped and threatened by police at least twice in recent months, has continued to support Charter '08 since she printed 400 flyers with abridged versions of the charter early last year.

She said she got the idea of distributing public information on Charter '08 after talking online to another activist, Ju Xuguang.

Ju, a teacher, was detained after handing out 100 copies of the charter to medical students in the northern city of Changzhi.

'After he did it, I thought I had to do the same. I printed out 400 copies and distributed about 100 copies,' Liu said in a recent interview.

Police detained Liu at a hostel shortly after she handed out copies in her home city in Nanyang in the central province of Henan.

At least two other activists were detained last year for printing T-shirts promoting the charter.

International rights groups have criticized China's growing crackdown on rights activists since the issue of the charter, and the suppression appears to have intensified since October 8.

'Countless other rights activists across the country have been harassed, summoned for questioning or detained,' US-based Human Rights Watch said on Wednesday.

'All the principal signatories and co-drafters of Charter '08 have been under tight police surveillance, prevented from meeting one another or giving interviews to the media, and denied the right to travel abroad,' it said.

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