A company lawyer for dissident Chinese artist Ai Weiwei (艾未未) said yesterday that Chinese tax authorities were hindering efforts to pay a financial guarantee enabling the company to fight a huge tax bill, which he said was government harassment.
Ai, an internationally acclaimed conceptual artist, was detained for nearly three months earlier this year during a crackdown on dissent. The detention and subsequent claims of tax evasion have been interpreted by activists as a way to punish him for his outspoken criticism of the authoritarian government.
The Beijing tax bureau is demanding that Ai’s design company, Beijing Fake Cultural Development, pay 15 million yuan (US$2.4 million) in back taxes and fines.
To fight the allegation, Fake Cultural must pay a guarantee, or deposit, of more than 8 million yuan by tomorrow to obtain an administrative review of the case.
The company can easily pay that because Ai’s supporters have sent him nearly 8.69 million yuan to help pay the guarantee.
However, Pu Zhiqiang (浦志強), a lawyer for Fake Cultural, said the tax bureau told them yesterday that it would not accept the guarantee in the form on which the parties had originally agreed.
Pu told reporters that the tax bureau wanted the money paid into one of its accounts, while Fake Cultural wanted to buy a certificate of deposit instead.
Pu said the company wanted to fight the tax evasion allegation and to do that it could not show in any way that it is admitting guilt.
He said he was worried that paying the money into a tax bureau account could be seen as an admission of guilt, adding that even if they win the appeal: “I worry that getting the money back will be difficult.”
A call to the propaganda office of the Beijing tax office rang unanswered yesterday.
Pu said the case was political, “a persecution that has been caused by the political background.”
He called for “the administrative organ to implement the law normally [and] stop acting foolishly.”
Ai’s supporters have sent money through wire transfers or thrown cash stuffed in envelopes or wrapped around fruit into his yard. The donation campaign is rare for Chinese dissidents because of the threat of retaliation that comes with supporting high-profile government critics.
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