Two years after her bookseller father vanished into Chinese detention, Angela Gui refuses to give up her campaign to free him, despite growing concerns for her own safety.
Gui Minhai (桂民海) disappeared on Oct. 17, 2015, one of five Hong Kong booksellers known for publishing gossipy titles about Chinese political leaders to go missing.
For the first 18 months, Angela Gui barely slept. However, the 23-year-old student has turned her campaign to release him into a kind of job, which she says is helping her to cope.
“My dad ... wouldn’t just be quiet if his own daughter ended up in that situation,” Angela Gui told reporters by telephone from England, where she is about to start doctoral studies at Cambridge University. “I thought: ‘Well if he would do that for me, I will just do what he would do.’”
She has had three brief telephone calls from her father since his disappearance, all telling her that he is fine and that she must not get involved with his case — which she believes he did not say voluntarily.
Angela Gui has refused to keep quiet and has regularly publicized Gui Minhai’s plight, including addressing a US congressional hearing on China’s persecution of its critics.
Last week, Angela Gui had the first news of her father in almost a year after Swedish Ambassador to China Anna Lindstedt was granted access to Gui Minhai.
Born in China and living in Hong Kong, Gui Minahi is also a Swedish citizen, having spent part of his life working there.
In the meeting with Lindstedt, Gui Minahi said that he “feels good,” Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs Deputy Director Patric Nilsson told reporters, adding that the Swedish government was working actively on the case.
“It was a huge relief to know not only was he alive, but he didn’t look as bad as one might fear,” said Angela Gui, who was told her father had no visible signs of injury.
Lindstedt also told Angela Gui that her father had spoken mostly about her in the 20-minute meeting.
“I was quite grateful that she told him I was doing really well, and for him not to worry,” Angela Gui said.
Gui Minhai, now 52, disappeared in 2015 while on vacation in Thailand and is being held at an undisclosed location in China.
Last year, he appeared on Chinese TV saying he had returned to take responsibility for his involvement in a fatal car accident years before in Zhejiang Province, a confession roundly dismissed by rights campaigners.
An official in Zhejiang told reporters the case was still under investigation.
Angela Gui said she has received no information on specific charges against him or how long he will be held.
Gui Minhai is the only one of the five booksellers still in detention.
His colleague Lam Wing-kei (林榮基) went missing in China and skipped bail on a return visit to Hong Kong to give an explosive account of his detention and interrogation.
Two others who went missing in China have been released.
Angela Gui said she believes they are under surveillance and unable to leave the mainland.
Lee Bo (李波) disappeared in Hong Kong and resurfaced over the border, later insisting he had gone there of his own volition to help with an investigation.
Lee, who Angela Gui said she knew well, was allowed to return to Hong Kong and has since maintained a low profile.
Angela Gui had asked her father whether his book work was risky, but he said it was legal in Hong Kong and he was not worried.
However, she knows he never gave his address for mail, using a post office box instead.
Since his disappearance, she has become concerned for her own safety.
She said she was jumped by two Chinese men who took photographs of her when she was attending a book fair in Germany.
She reported it to police in the UK and Sweden, who gave her numbers to call in an emergency and warned her not to travel to Asia.
Angela Gui said she feels safe in England, but the restrictions are a reminder of a “sense of threat.”
She still hopes her father will soon return home.
“Otherwise I’d feel pointless doing what I do,” Angela Gui said, adding that she wants to hold a vigil outside the Chinese embassy in London on the anniversary of his disappearance next month.
“Something to show we haven’t forgotten,” she said.
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