Deceased Nobel Peace Prize-winning Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo (劉曉波) was yesterday cremated and his wife is “free,” a government official said, as a state-run newspaper attacked him as a “despised” criminal out of step with Chinese society.
Liu, 61, died of multiple organ failure on Thursday in a hospital in the northeastern city of Shenyang, where he was being treated for late-stage liver cancer, having been given medical parole but not freed.
His wife, Liu Xia (劉霞), has been under effective house arrest since her husband won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2010, but had been allowed to visit him in prison about once a month. She has never been formally charged with any crime.
Photo: Shenyang Municipal Information Office via AP
Shenyang city government information official Zhang Qingyang (張清洋) said Liu Xiaobo was cremated yesterday morning, in accordance with his relatives’ wishes and local customs.
Liu Xia was present and was given the ashes, Zhang told a news conference in Shenyang.
“According to my understanding, Liu Xia is currently free,” he said, adding that as a Chinese citizen, her rights would be protected under the law. “But she just lost her spouse. She is extremely sad. In the period after dealing with the death of Liu Xiaobo, she won’t take any more outside disturbances. This is the wish of the family members. It’s natural.”
Zhang did not say where Liu Xia was.
A government statement said Mozart’s Requiem was played during the funeral.
Liu family lawyer Mo Shaoping said he did not know whether the cremation was in accordance with family wishes, as they had been unreachable.
“They are likely still to be under the watch and control of authorities,” Mo said. “They can’t be contacted.”
In funeral photographs handed out by the city government, Liu Xia and other family members stand around the coffin containing Liu’s body, surrounded by white flowers.
Another photograph shows what appears to be a box containing Liu’s ashes being presented to Liu Xia, as she clasps a black-and-white photograph of her husband.
Rights groups and Western governments have mourned Liu Xiaobo’s death and urged authorities to grant freedom of movement to his wife and the rest of his family.
Efforts are being made to secure permission from Chinese authorities for Liu Xia and her brother Liu Hui to leave, a Western diplomat said on Friday.
Liu wanted to overthrow China’s political system, the state-run Global Times said yesterday.
“This is why Chinese society opposes and despises him,” it said in an English-language editorial. “He was paranoid, naive and arrogant.”
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