China has arrested an activist who gathered 10,000 signatures for an open letter spurning the Beijing Olympics and demanding human rights, a rights group and a dissident said yesterday.
Yang Chunlin (楊春林) was arrested in Heilongjiang Province on July 6 and charged on Monday with trying to subvert state power, a statement by a loose coalition of activists known as the China Human Rights Defenders said.
Veteran dissident Hu Jia (胡佳) said the arrest was part of a government crackdown to "clear up" politically sensitive cases ahead of next year's Beijing Games.
"Right now I'm helping Yang Chunlin to hire a lawyer," Hu said by phone from the Beijing home where he lives under tight police control.
"The authorities have threatened Yang's family and relatives Yang's wife dares not speak to anyone because of the threats," Hu said.
China Human Rights Defenders said Yang's arrest was linked to an open letter entitled "We Want Human Rights, Not The Olympics," which was signed by more than 10,000 people.
Yang had been helping the farmers seek legal redress over the loss of their farmland due to land expropriation, it said.
Land confiscation has become a hot social issue in China, with citizens routinely accusing local officials of colluding with land developers in lucrative real estate deals that begin with government-backed land acquisitions.
Rights activists say large numbers of Beijing residents have been forced from their homes by Olympics-related construction projects.
The rights group said that Yang's arrest was "alarming" and expressed shock at the willingness of the government to make opposition to the Olympics "a political crime."
"The China Human Rights Defenders condemn the arrest of Yang Chunlin on suspicion of subversion because he dissented from the official line on the Olympics," the group's statement said.
"The direct involvement of the Ministry of Public Security in ordering Yang's arrest, and the subversion charge against him, point to the nervousness and political sensitivity with which the government views efforts to link the Olympics and human rights," it said.
‘CROSSING THE LINE’: China’s embassy in Seoul criticized US Forces Korea Commander General Xavier Brunson, asking if his ‘hostile’ remarks were authorized by Washington South Korea and the US are in talks over recent public remarks by the commander of US Forces Korea, Seoul’s presidential office said yesterday, after the comments drew sharp criticism from China. In a recent podcast interview, US Forces Korea Commander General Xavier Brunson described South Korea as “the dagger in the heart of Asia” from China’s east coast, prompting the Chinese embassy in Seoul to say that he had “truly crossed the line.” The interview came amid growing speculation that Washington might seek to expand the role of US Forces Korea in countering the growing regional influence of China, a key
Through the noise of rushing papers and whirring belts at a print factory in Kyoto, two creators watch their photo essay come to life in broadsheet form — part of an effort to win new audiences in the age of artificial intelligence (AI). Despite the decline of the publishing industry, self-publication and handmade “zine” magazines are growing in popularity in Japan, reflecting the nation’s enduring love of paper in the digital era. While speaking to Agence France-Presse at the plant, his hands black with ink, one of the creators, Kazuma Obara, said: “I think [paper] is a medium that engages all five
Australian researchers have trained lab-grown brain cells on a silicon computer chip to play the 1990s shooter game Doom and said they are just scratching the surface of what the neurons could be capable of doing. It is the science-fiction work of biotech boffins at Cortical Labs, who researched and developed the technology that harnesses the workings of the brain’s networking system. Each so-called “biological computer” contains about 200,000 living human brain cells, grown from stem cells that were harvested from blood donations. Having mastered the simple computer game Pong, where a paddle is moved up and down to send a ball
France experienced its hottest spring on record, the French weather service said on Tuesday, after an exceptional early heat wave that also broke highs for the season in England and Wales. Meteo-France said the average nationwide temperature over March to May was 13.8°C — about 1.7°C above the norm, and surpassing records set in 2011 and 2020. “The warmest spring since records began in 1900,” it said in a bulletin. All three months were warmer than average, but the onset of an “unprecedented heatwave” late last month pushed the mercury to highs typically seen at the height of the summer. “Our country had never
RSS