Letter from Harvard Immigration and Refugee Clinic of Greater Boston Legal Services, Inc. and Harvard Law School
Dear Ms. Vischera and Ms. Ladugi: On behalf of Ms. Fu Xiang (Christina Fu), we are writing to up-date Amnesty International concerning the on-going detention of Dr. Yang Jianli by the Chinese government. During the last week of July of this year, we contacted your International Office in London to inquire whether Amnesty International was going to play a role in advocating for the immediate release of Dr. Yang Jianli. Based on this communication and on behalf of Ms. Christina Fu, we have prepared the attached Up-date of Facts Relating to Dr. Yang Jianli´s On-going Detention in China. We convey this information to you in the hope that Amnesty International will actively join the many international voices advocating for Dr. Yang Jianli´s immediate safe release from detention. Ms. Fu and Dr. Yang Jianli´s colleagues fear for his safety and life as he has long advocated for democracy and fundamental change in China. It is our sincere opinion that any possibility of Dr. Yang´s detention being deemed prosecution has long since vanished. Aside from fearing that he is being mistreated in detention, the fact that he is being held in violation of his due process rights both under Chinese and International Human Rights Law and the rights guaranteed to his family under Chinese law all clearly evidence that Dr. Yang has now fallen victim to persecution by the Chinese authorities. The fear that Dr. Yang is being mistreated is supported for example by Amnesty´s 2002 Annual Report which states that in China"[t]orture and ill-treatment continued to be widespread, occurring in many state institutions." For these reasons, on behalf of Christina Fu, we request that Amnesty International consider adopting Dr. Yang Jianli as a prisoner of conscience, or at the very least organize appeals for his immediate release. We thank you for your consideration. If there are any questions you may have on this matter please do no hesitate to contact us using the information bellow. Sincerely, John Willshire-Carrera Nancy Kelly Juan Gomez Attachment: Up-date Summary of Facts Relating to Dr. Yang Jianli´s On-going Detention in China On April 26, 2002 while traveling through China and meeting labor activists, Dr. Yang Jianli was detained in China by Chinese authorities. Because of his extensive political involvement, Dr. Yang Jianli has been targeted by the Chinese government in violation of his human rights, as well as Chinese and international law. The Chinese Government has held him incommunicado and denied him his fundamental due process rights. To date, the Chinese government has refused to provide Dr.Yang Jianli´s family and colleagues with any information concerning his well-being and even the charges that are being contemplated against him. Each additional day Dr. Yang Jianli is detained by the Chinese government, concern by his family and colleagues for his well-being and safety grows. Dr. Yang Jianli is a political activist with a doctorate in Political Economy from Harvard University and a doctorate in Mathematics from the University of California at Berkeley. While a student at the University of California at Berkeley, Dr. Yang Jianli traveled to China to render aid to the protesters of Tiananmen Square. Because of his involvement, he was blacklisted from reentering China. From the time he returned to the United States, Dr. Yang Jianli has remained very active in Chinese dissident politics. Among other things, he became president of the U.S. branch of the Federation for a Democratic China where he produced extensive pro-democratic literature denouncing human rights violations by the Chinese government. He also produced extensive pro-democracy literature for publication in various dissident journals such as China Spring and Beijing Spring. As a spokesperson for the Chinese dissident community, Dr. Yang Jianli also has testified before U.S. Senate and House of Representatives on human rights violations, especially concerning the massacre in Tiananmen Square, and efforts to democratize in China. In the early 90´s he, along with other well known prominent political dissidents, founded the Foundation for China in the 21st Century. The Foundation is a political think tank whose goals include analyzing and providing a pro-democracy critique of the Chinese government and increasingly putting forth an alternative to the political structure in China. In pursuit of these goals, over the years the Foundation has organized meetings of prominent dissidents, and also international meetings of ethnic and minority group leaders including those in opposition to the Chinese government. The Foundation has coordinated and participated in projects that set the groundwork for alternative futures for China. Through it´s work, the Foundation provides assistance to pro-democracy activists in China, has participated actively in organizing dissidents internationally, and has helped facilitate communication among various ethnic and minority groups such as those in Taiwan and Tibet. Dr. Yang Jianli recently focused his attention on investigating ongoing large-scale labor unrest in the northeastern part of China. Following the strikes, Dr. Yang Jianli decided to personally meet the workers to investigate their situation in order to inform the expatriot dissident community of these struggles and to determine whether that community could provide support to their cause. Given that he was blacklisted and that the Chinese government had refused to renew his passport for a number of years, Dr. Yang Jianli traveled to China using another person´s travel documents. Upon arriving to China, Dr. Yang Jianli met with some of the tens of thousands of workers in Daqing and Liaoyang who had been involved in the March protests over unpaid wages, pension disputes and joblessness. Then on April 26, Ms. Christina Fu, Yang Jianli´s wife, received a telephone call from her husband informing her that he had been detained by airport security at Kunming, Yunnan province. They had detained Dr Yang Jianli after accusing him of using someone else´s identification documents while attempting to board a plane. After accusing him, his luggage was searched, his documents were seized, and he was taken to a hotel. At the hotel two police officers were left guarding him. From that day forward he has been held incommunicado from anyone, including his wife, family and colleagues. To the best of his family´s and colleague´s knowledge, the Chinese Government has never charged him with a crime, informed him of the charges, or allowed anybody to communicate with him. Given Dr. Yang Jianli´s history, Ms. Christina Fu and a number of their colleagues immediately launched a campaign. Through letters to U.S. congressmen and officials as well as international dignitaries, Ms. Fu worked tirelessly to find any available information about the detention and condition of her husband. Numerous dissidents rallied to her aid. After over two weeks of no information, on May 10, Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Kong Quan confirmed that a man, who claimed to be Yang Jianli, had entered China using another person´s passport. He, however, refrained from giving any further details. Receiving no further information, Ms. Fu, in a desperate attempt to find her husband, traveled to China on May 23. At the Beijing airport, Ms. Fu was detained and questioned for two hours. She was then informed that the Chinese government was denying her entrance to China because she was seen as a threat to the Chinese state. When she insisted on inquiring about her husband, Ms. Fu was told that the guard knew nothing about his case and was warned to leave immediately. She was promptly sent to Canada. Following Ms. Fu´s return, Dr. Yang Jianli´s brother, Yang Jianjun, who lives in China continued the effort of acquiring information about his brother´s whereabouts and his well-being, which to date the government refuses to provide. Among other things, even when his brother attempted to retain counsel for Dr. Yang Jianli, the lawyer explained that he could not enter an appearance unless he knew where Dr. Yang Jianli was being detained and what he was being charged with. In effect, by refusing to issue a detention notice, they prevented Yang Jianjun from securing a lawyer for his brother. On the twenty-first of June, the Linyi city, Shandong province police telephoned Mr. Yang Jianjun informing him that his brother was being formally arrested and was being held in Beijing. He refused to give any further information. On that same date, the U.S. Department of State informed Ms. Fu that they had received information from the Chinese government that Dr.Yang Jianli was being formally arrested but had still not been formally charged. Later, on July 12, the China desk of the U.S. Department of State notified Ms. Christina Fu that Dr. Yang Jianli was being held at Beijing City Public Security Facility. However, neither she nor any of their family colleagues have received any information to date nor has the Chinese government formally charged Dr. Yang Jianli. During the last three months, as concern for Dr. Yang Jianli´s well-being has grown, the campaign has been internationalized. Among other things, over 170 Chinese political activists from over 20 provinces and cities in China have signed a petition demanding his release. It has been reported that Zhao Changqing, one of the organizers of the signature campaign, disappeared on July third and it is believed that the Chinese authorities detained him. Additionally, on July 12, over 200 people from outside China wrote to Secretary General Kofi A. Annan asking him to intervene in this matter and to call for the investigation of the detention of Dr. Yang Jianli. Since the campaign was started, numerous other letters and articles petitioning for Dr. Yang Jianli have been written, as well, as sent to the Chinese Government, the US Government and the UN. They had for years refused to let Dr. Yang Jianli return and blacklisted him because of his prominent dissident activities. Regardless of the reasons for his detention in April, his treatment has long since turned from prosecution to persecution. Every day he´s held makes this increasingly obvious. In addition to everything else, China´s detention of Dr. Yang Jianli is in violation of both Chinese and International human rights law. Dr. Yang Jianli has been in detention for over one hundred days without any detention notice being issued, without any details of his status being made available to his family, without any details being given of formal charges if any, without access to counsel, and without being allowed to communicate with his family. While Chinese Criminal Procedural Law requires that the family or employer of a person detained be contacted within 24 hours of the detention, the Chinese government has yet to present them with a detention notice. Under Chinese law, in circumstances of emergency, a person can be held for up to 37 days without a warrant. Again the Chinese government has clearly violated their own law both through his prolonged detention and through the failure to state an emergency. Further, as a detainee, Dr. Yang Jianli has the right to an attorney unless "state secrets" are involved. Once again, the government has denied access to a lawyer by refusing to provide his family with a detention notice and failed to establish that state secrets are involved. As a detention notice is required in order to reach him, failure to issue one has also resulted in the denial of the family´s access to him. By refusing to issuing a detention notice the Chinese Government is intentionally denying Dr. Yang Jianli access to both an attorney and his family. Although China has not ratified the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), as a signatory, it is obligated to refrain from acting in a manner that directly violates the purpose of the treaty. The treaty provides that a detainee cannot be denied the right to communicate with his family "for more than a matter of days." To date, Dr. Yang Jianli has never been allowed to speak with any members of his family. The ICCPR also states that anyone detained "shall be brought promptly before a judge and shall be entitled to trial within a reasonable time or to release." The U.N. Human Rights Committee has decided that a delay of over two-months violates this requirement. Again to date, the Chinese government has not brought him to court and tried him for any offenses. Finally, under international law, anyone detained is entitled to challenge the lawfulness of his detention. As the U.N. Human Rights Committee has decided, incommunicado detention renders such challenges impossible. Clearly the Chinese government is once again in violation of the covenant and is therefore a violation of this provision. Clearly, the Chinese government is in violation of it´s own domestic and international laws as they relate to Dr. Yang Jianli´s detention. The Chinese government is using the fact that Dr. Yang Jianli has used another´s travel documents to persecute him as an opponent of the government. ¡¡ -------------------------- |
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