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Reebok gongs PRC activist

AIDS activist Li Dan (李丹), whose work to expose the extent of the epidemic in China has sometimes made him a target for authorities, was one of three recipients of a human rights award from sports shoemaker Reebok yesterday.

Li, director of the China Orchid AIDS Project, had been "instrumental in bringing attention to the plight of people living with the disease in China," Reebok said in a news release announcing its Reebok Human Rights Award.

"Li Dan has pressured the Chinese government to respond to the country's rapidly escalating HIV epidemic and has risked his personal safety" to help nurture and educate AIDS orphans rejected by their communities and schools, it said.

The prize, given to activists aged 30 or younger, includes a grant of US$50,000.

In an interview with AP, Li said he still didn't believe China was being straightforward about the real number of AIDS victims in the country.

In related news, a Chinese AIDS activist missing for weeks was released by police yesterday, but a New York Times researcher was still in detention 11 days after a charge against him of leaking state secrets was dropped.

AIDS activist Hu Jia (胡佳) returned to his home in Tongzhou on the outskirts of Beijing after being held by police and the state security apparatus at an undisclosed location for about six weeks, his wife Zeng Jinyan (曾金燕) said by telephone.

Friends and family had tried to locate Hu but police and the state security apparatus had refused to confirm or deny if they were holding him.

Hu was taken into custody ahead of the annual session of parliament and after going on a "relay" hunger strike to protest what he and colleagues said was the government's hiring of thugs to beat up a civil rights campaigner in Guangdong Province last month.

A court agreed this month to a decision by prosecutors to drop the charges of fraud and leaking state secrets against New York Times researcher Zhao Yan (趙岩) in a surprise concession ahead of President Hu Jintao's (胡錦濤) visit to the US next month.

But Zhao remained in custody on Tuesday.
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