Relatives of a Chinese lawyer who was released from prison last week say they are concerned about his physical and mental health because of abuse he suffered during years in custody.
The lawyer, Gao Zhisheng (高智晟), is staying with family members in the western Chinese region of Xinjiang, but he remains under close watch by security officials, according to Washington-based advocacy group Freedom Now.
In prison, Gao was fed a restricted diet of bread and cabbage, causing him to lose about 23kg. He also lost several teeth, apparently because of malnutrition, according to lawyer Jared Genser, who also represents Gao’s wife and children, who now live in the US.
Genser said it was difficult to determine the full extent of Gao’s ill health because he is unable to speak coherently, probably a result of years spent in solitary confinement in a small cell. Deprived of reading material and television, Gao was reported to have been denied all communication with the outside world.
“Gao is just completely and utterly broken,” Genser said. “He is in absolutely horrific shape.”
Prison officials in Xinjiang could not be reached for comment.
Gao’s brother, Gao Zhiyi (高智義), said by telephone that Gao was waiting to see a doctor.
Details about Gao’s health were conveyed through a sister-in-law, who is taking care of him.
Once loquacious and articulate, Gao is barely able to speak and can do so only in very short sentences, she told family members.
Gao, 50, was a well-known defense lawyer — he was named one of China’s top 10 lawyers by the country’s Justice Ministry in 2001 — but he fell foul of the authorities after he began to represent clients in politically charged cases, including members of the Falun Gong spiritual movement, which China has outlawed.
In 2005, he wrote an open letter to China’s leadership about the abuses suffered by Falun Gong adherents, and a year later he was convicted of “inciting subversion of state power,” which began a series of detentions and disappearances.
In 2007, he described the torture he had endured by state security agents after writing an open letter to the US Congress.
In addition to repeated beatings, he said the police had placed electric shocks on his genitals and held lit cigarettes to his eyes.
His wife, Geng He (耿和), and two children, who had been the targets of threats from the police, escaped China in early 2009 by fleeing overland to Thailand, eventually gaining asylum in the US.
In 2011, a court in Beijing ordered that he serve out the three-year suspended sentence he had received earlier on a charge of inciting subversion.
In a statement to Freedom Now, Geng urged US President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry to press the Chinese to allow her husband to join his family in the US and receive medical treatment.
“I am completely devastated by what the Chinese government has done to my husband,” she said. “The only thing I feared more than him being killed was his suffering relentless and horrific torture and being kept alive.”
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