China Confines Human Rights Lawyers Ahead of International Human Rights Day

Messages in support of jailed Chinese human rights lawyer Wang Quanzhang (pictured R on pl
ANTHONY WALLACE/AFP via Getty Images
Frances Martel

The families of at least three human rights lawyers in China denounced police harassment and the imposition of an impromptu ban on leaving the house in anticipation of International Human Rights Day, celebrated annually on December 10.

The Chinese Communist Party has repressed individuals who serve as defense lawyers for “counter-revolutionary” people for decades, with those taking on human rights cases at the top of that list. Human rights lawyers who escape Chinese custody have complained of a near-total lack of due process and torture while in prison. Many of those attorneys are arrested on charges of “subverting state power,” a crime in the country, or placed under house arrest if international pressure makes their continued disappearance into the Chinese penal system too much of a diplomatic liability.

The Hong Kong Free Press (HKFP) identified three attorneys — Wang Quanzhang, Li Heping, and Yu Wensheng — whose family’s mobility China had significantly limited by Wednesday. Both the attorneys and their families encountered law enforcement preventing them from leaving their homes with no clear explanation. Communist Party officials reportedly did not allow the lawyers’ children to attend school.

Wang spent four years in prison following his arrest in 2015 as part of the violent disappearance of hundreds of human rights activists that has come to be known as the “709 crackdown.” Wang belonged to the Beijing Fengrui Law Firm, which specialized in cases against the state for human rights abuses. Wang personally represented abused practitioners of Falun Gong, a religious movement the Communist Party considers “counterrevolutionary.” Beijing shut the firm down abruptly in 2018, the year it convicted Wang of “subversion of state power.” Reports during Wang’s detention accused Chinese guards of torturing Wang with electricity, among other measures that would constitute grave international legal crimes.

Wang was released to his family in Beijing in April and immediately placed under “coronavirus quarantine,” though authorities gave him no reason they suspected him of carrying the virus. He has since attempted to use the Chinese legal system to file charges in July against officials he said tortured him while behind bars. The case has so far not led to any meaningful due process.

Wang’s wife Li Wenzu posted videos on social media on Wednesday showing a group of individuals who appeared to be state agents blocking the family’s door, blocking the view through their door’s peephole, and preventing them from leaving.

Yu Wensheng remains in prison after his conviction in June on charges of “subversion of state power” related to his work representing some of the lawyers arrested during the 2015 709 crackdown. Prior to his arrest, he had written publicly calling for changes in the communist system. A Chinese court sentenced him to four years in prison.

Wife Xu Yan denounced on Wednesday that Chinese state authorities stopped her from leaving the house and explicitly told her the reason was to prevent her from participating in any activities for International Human Rights Day.

“They said that for sure they won’t let me out on December 9 and 10,” Xu said, according to the HKFP. “They said they have to stop me from participating in a Human Rights Day event at the European Union’s Embassy or the United States Embassy.”

In her husband’s absence, Xu has taken up his cause.

“After Yu was detained, I began facing intimidation as well. Police threatened to arrest me if I continued to speak up for human rights, accept media interviews or communicate with people outside China,” Xu said in a statement published by Amnesty International in July. “Sometimes they would come and knock on my door at night. I am still under heavy surveillance — sometimes the police follow me when I am out. But I am stubborn. I have refused to give up and tried my best to defend my husband’s rights.”

A third lawyer — Li Heping, who spent two years in prison for “subversion of state power” after defending Falun Gong practitioners and was also arrested in the 2015 wave — also experienced harassment and false imprisonment in their homes with little explanation in anticipation of the global observance of human rights norms. Wife Wang Qiaoling published a video on Twitter showing an attempt to leave the house to walk her dog, met with extreme resistance by a group of unidentified people at her door. An attempted to leave the house to drop of their daughter at school also resulted in authorities blocking them, preventing the girl from attending.

“When I practice as a lawyer, you destroyed my license; when I have a child, you don’t allow my kid to go to school, and now you won’t let us out of the house, are you people thugs?” Li can reportedly be heard saying in the video.

Li Heping represented Wang Quanzhang following his arrest, supporting his wife, Li Wenzu, in a 60-mile protest walk from Beijing to Tianjin to demand justice for her husband. At the time, Li Wenzu told reporters she had no idea if her husband was alive.

The Japanese network NHK reported on Thursday that “several other activists,” which it did not name, experienced similar harassment and unlawful detention.

Repression of human rights lawyers increased significantly since dictator Xi Jinping took over the country in 2013. By 2017, Xi’s regime had arrested or otherwise persecuted over 300 human rights lawyers, many which remain trapped in the penal system. The destruction of the Beijing Fengrui law firm essentially outlawed vocal advocacy for human rights in the legal system, as the lawyers who once worked there, now identified as former employees, left with little to no job prospects. The firm once housed nearly 100 human rights lawyers, making it the largest such organization in China. The firm had already suffered a raid in 2015 on claims that the firm was a “criminal syndicate” for doing defense work.

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