I. Summary

“Xinjiang will always keep up the intensity of its crackdown on ethnic separatist forces and deal them devastating blows without showing any mercy.”¹

Xinjiang Party Secretary Wang Lequan, January 2003

China is known for tight constraints on freedom of religion. This is particularly evident in its northwest Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region (XUAR), an oil-rich area that borders eight other nations. Here the Muslim faith of Uighurs, the largest non-Chinese ethnic group in the region, is under wholesale assault by the state. Uighurs have enjoyed autonomy in the past. Many now desire greater autonomy than is currently allowed; others demand a separate state. Uighurs are thus seen in Beijing as an ethno-nationalist threat to the Chinese state. Islam is perceived as feeding Uighur ethnic identity, and so the subordination of Islam to the state is used as a means to ensure the subordination of Uighurs as well.

Documents obtained and interviews conducted by Human Rights Watch reveal a multi-tiered system of surveillance, control, and suppression of religious activity aimed at Xinjiang’s Uighurs. At its most extreme, peaceful activists who practice their religion in a manner deemed unacceptable by state authorities or Chinese Communist Party (CCP) officials are arrested, tortured, and at times executed. The harshest punishments are meted out to those accused of involvement in separatist activity, which is increasingly equated by officials with “terrorism.” Because of fears in Beijing of the power of separatist messages, independent religious activity or dissent is at times arbitrarily equated with a breach of state security, a serious crime in China and one that is frequently prosecuted. 

At a more mundane and routine level, many Uighurs experience harassment in their daily lives. Celebrating religious holidays, studying religious texts, or showing one’s religion through personal appearance are strictly forbidden at state schools. The Chinese government has instituted controls over who can be a cleric, what version of the Koran may be used, where religious gatherings may be held, and what may be said on religious occasions. 

Violations of these strictures can result in expulsion, fines, entries into the personal file that the state keeps on every Chinese citizen, harassment of one’s family, and administrative punishments, including short-term detention and administrative detention in China’s notorious and discredited reeducation through labor (RTL) program.

This report, based on previously undisclosed regulations and policy documents, as well as interviews in Xinjiang and elsewhere, makes it clear that systematic repression of religion continues in Xinjiang as a matter of considered state policy. It explains key changes in official terminology that signal important policy shifts and describes the principles that are expected to guide the actions of officials.

This report details for the first time the complex architecture of law, regulation, and policy in Xinjiang that denies Uighurs religious freedom. These include:

the current regulations governing religious activities in Xinjiang;

a manual for government and Party cadres on implementing policy on minority religious affairs, circulated internally in 2000, that elaborates many of the repressive practices subsequently codified in the regulations;

regulations prohibiting the participation of minors in any religious activity;

documents acknowledging vast increases in the number of Uighurs imprisoned or held administratively for alleged religious and state security offenses, including through the discredited reeducation through labor system; and

regulations detailing how religious and ethnic minority matters come to be classified as “state secrets.” 

These documents are deemed extremely sensitive and are accordingly restricted to internal Party or Party and government circulation. They are made public for the first time in this report and a selection can be found in the appendices.

In November 2004, China promulgated stringent new national religious regulations, effective March 1, 2005.² According to article one of the new regulations, two of the main purposes are to ensure “freedom of religious belief” and to regulate “the administration of religious affairs,” objectives consistent with earlier policy statements, regulations, and practice. Although it cannot be predicted what the effects of implementation will be, the new regulations add additional layers of complexity to an already burdensome regulatory structure. It would appear that the government's unstated aims are twofold: to make it more difficult than ever for a religious body or a church, mosque, temple, monastery, or congregation to exist without State approval; and to solidify oversight of the personnel, finances, and activities of every approved religious body or site. Because of certain similarities between the new national regulations and the pre-existing regulatory structure in Xinjiang (stricter than elsewhere in China with the exception of Tibet), it appears that policies in place in Xinjiang may have influenced the new national standards.

While China’s constitution, many of its laws, and various government white papers on religion and ethnic minorities contain guarantees of religious freedom, the reality is that Muslims in Xinjiang have only as much religious freedom as local and national authorities choose to allow at any given moment. For many who experience state repression, arbitrariness is the touchstone: what is permissible for some can result in harsh punishment for others, particularly those suspected of having separatist tendencies, leadership qualities, or disloyal political views. Genuine freedom of religion, that is, the right of individuals to freely practice their religion with others, is conspicuously absent for Uighurs in Xinjiang.

Informants interviewed for this report gave accounts of how the legal and regulatory framework is implemented in Xinjiang––from the annual training of imams for conformity with a government role, to the destruction of “non-conforming” mosques, to the control of religious publications, to purges of schools.

Since the mid-1990s, state control of Islam has evolved from a focus on clergy to harassment of laity. We heard often that mosques are under comprehensive government control and surveillance, designed to discourage attendance, especially by children or young adults. Students and civil servants reported that it was impossible for them to publicly engage in any religious activity other than observing the Muslim ban on eating pork. Others told of people losing jobs, or even being arrested, because they were perceived as too religious. Both practicing and non-observant Muslims explained that there is almost no public latitude for religious expression. Hardly any young practicing Uighur Muslim we spoke with was without a story of harassment.

One of the most common devices for religious repression in Xinjiang is the annual “strike hard” campaign against general criminality. While “strike hard” is carried out throughout the country and leads to abuses wherever it is implemented, in Xinjiang it is used to crack down on Uighur religious activity on the theory that such activity is a cover for separatist activity.

Although official statistics on arrests, sentencing, and executions are kept secret, the contents of local media reports monitored by Human Rights Watch are consistent with estimates that thousands are detained every year for “illegal religious activity.” In September 2004, Xinjiang’s Chinese Communist Party Secretary acknowledged that the authorities had prosecuted twenty-two cases of groups and individuals involved in “separatist and terrorist activities” in the first eight months of the year, and had passed fifty sentences, including an unspecified number of death sentences, which at the time had not been carried out. Xinjiang leads the nation in executions for state security “crimes,” with over 200 people sentenced to death since 1997.

Beijing asserts that heavy-handed measures are necessary to address its concerns about Uighur separatist activity and Islamic-based terrorism in the region. Although there is no question that some Uighur extremists have advocated violent overthrow of Chinese rule, such individuals are a small minority, even among Uighur political activists. If anything, as described below, recent evidence shows a decline in militant activity in the region. Chinese fears likely have been exacerbated by its relatively weak control of the region compared to other areas, and the region’s hard-to-police border with eight countries. In addition, in recent years, Xinjiang has become an economic asset to China, with discoveries of oil that make it an attractive investment destination. This has led to strategic and security concerns finding their way to the top of political decision-making about Xinjiang. One result is that all policies in Xinjiang have an “anti-separatism” element; stamping down on freedom of religion is seen as a useful tool in this campaign.

For Beijing, Xinjiang falls into the same broad category of political concerns as Taiwan and Tibet. Demands for separation and/or autonomy are seen in Beijing as a threat to the continued viability of the Chinese state––they are a dangerous signal to the many parts of the country with large ethnic-minority populations––and the rule of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). 

Thus, a primary purpose of this highly repressive regulatory framework is the enforcement of loyalty to the Chinese Communist Party and the state. Public expression of dissent or deviance from the Party line is associated in Party documents, the press, and the courts with “harming national unity,” “disuniting nationalities,” or even “harming State security,” charges which carry very heavy penalties under China’s criminal law.³ This aggressive response to real or potential dissent is reflected in the bellicosne tone of official speeches and policy documents, in which authorities are called upon to “smash,” “suppress,” “eliminate,” and “wipe out” unlawful religious activities and to “rectify,” “reeducate,” and “wage war against” non-conforming believers and clergy.

Separatist sentiments are a reality in Xinjiang, though they provide no justification for the broad denial of basic rights. There appears to be strong popular support for genuine autonomy from China in a province more than 3,000 kilometers from Beijing, with a distinct history, ethnic make-up, and culture. In spite of large-scale Chinese migration, more than half of the population continues to be of Central Asian origin and Muslim. Much like Tibetans, the Uighurs in Xinjiang are concerned for their cultural survival in the face of a government-supported influx of ethnic Chinese migrants.

China’s efforts to control Uighur religion are so pervasive that they appear to go beyond suppression to a level of punitive control seemingly designed to entirely refashion Uighur religious identity to the state’s purposes. Non-Uighur groups are not perceived as presenting a secessionist threat for Xinjiang and are subject to less stringent controls. The other ethnic groups in Xinjiang (Kazakhs, Tajiks, Uzbeks, Mongols, and others) have independent states outside China and are not perceived to have similar ethno-nationalist aspirations. Among the major Islamic groups, only the Uighurs do not.

For most Uighurs the paramount issue is not religion per se, but the perceived threat that religious repression poses to their distinct identity coupled with their acute feeling of being colonized. They view the tight restrictions placed by the Chinese authorities on Uighur Islam as an attempt to debase their very identity, as Islam is an essential component of their traditional identity and culture.

Apparently for precisely this reason, religious activity among Uighurs is presumptively illegitimate unless approved by the CCP apparatus. Despite the Chinese government’s claim that it guarantees the right to freedom of religion, such respect applies only to what is essentially “state-sanctioned” religion.

Genuine freedom of religion, which includes the right to manifest, in public or private, alone or in community with others, one’s religion or belief in worship, observance, practice, and teaching, is plainly absent for Uighurs in Xinjiang.

China’s attempts to suppress Islam as a motive force for separatism by confining it to tight state control is not only profoundly violative of human rights, but is a policy that is likely to alienate Uighurs, drive religious expression further underground, and encourage the development of more radicalized and oppositional forms of religious identity. Moderate voices that could mediate tensions between the state and this minority population are likely to dwindle.

Since September 11, 2001, China has attempted to position its repression of Uighurs as part of the global “war on terror.” By exploiting the climate that followed the attacks on the United States and the fact that some Uighurs were found fighting in Afghanistan, China has consistently and largely successfully portrayed Uighurs as the source of a serious Islamic terrorist threat in Xinjiang. This perception seems to have now become dominant with the Chinese public, which because of the lack of a free media has little ability to compare sources of information and come to independent judgments about this claim.

The incorporation of the “terrorist” label into the public discourse has in turn heightened distrust between the Uighur and ethnic Chinese communities in Xinjiang. Uighurs interviewed in the region point out that opponents to Chinese rule in the area have been given many labels over the last half-century: they were described by the state as feudal elements and as ethnic nationalists in the 1950s and 1960s, as counter-revolutionaries in the 1970s and 1980s, as separatists in the 1990s, and now, since 2001, as terrorists.

In the immediate aftermath of the attacks on the United States, China successfully lobbied Washington to support its efforts to place the “East Turkestan Islamic Movement” (ETIM) on a United Nations list of banned terrorist organizations. While small pro-independence organizations have in the past resorted to violence, since 1998 there have been no reports of significant militant activity. This is not to suggest that there may not be individuals or groups who continue to embrace violence to further their political goals. But Chinese officials admit that in recent years separatist activity has actually decreased and is not a threat to the viability of the state. China has opportunistically used the post-September 11 environment to make the outrageous claim that individuals disseminating peaceful religious and cultural messages in Xinjiang are terrorists who have simply changed tactics. 

Human Rights Watch urges China to reconsider its approach to religion and human rights in Xinjiang. China’s friends and neighbors, many of them Islamic states, and groups like the Organization of the Islamic Conference should insist that China make public all regulations on religion applicable to Xinjiang. China should be pressured to invite and allow unfettered access to the U.N. Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief and invite the U.N. Working Group on Arbitrary Detention to return to China for the express purpose of visiting Xinjiang on terms fully consistent with its mandate.

In view of China’s record of arrest, imprisonment, torture, and even execution of religious prisoners, no country should participate in deportation, extradition, or rendition of Uighurs to China. Foreign investors in Xinjiang should insist on religious freedom within their workplaces and ensure that their operations do not in any way abet the lack of religious freedom in Xinjiang. The United States should not, for political convenience, acquiesce in any future demands from China to place organizations on lists of terrorist organizations without sufficient evidence.

A note on methodology

This report is based on previously unavailable documentary sources as well as interviews with Uighur individuals at different times over a period of three years. In Xinjiang, Human Rights Watch visited urban and rural areas and interviewed people from all walks of life, including students, teachers, private and state-sector employees, business owners, unemployed individuals, farmers, migrant workers, clerics and journalists. We visited mosques, schools, universities, hospitals, bazaars, restaurants, tourist sites, and other public places. Interviews were also conducted in the street, in trains, buses, and private cars.

Because of the highly repressive climate prevailing in Xinjiang, Uighur individuals have a legitimate fear of being seen, heard, or even suspected of talking with outsiders about government policies. Respondents frequently observe that many people serve as government agents, willingly or unwillingly, making it unsafe to talk publicly about sensitive issues such as religion and ethnicity. In private and secure settings, however, most interviewees freely expressed their views.

To protect interviewees, in this report we have used pseudonyms and omitted the place of interview where necessary to protect the identity of persons who spoke with us. Where pseudonyms are used, the citations so indicate.

There is no international standardized romanization for the Turkic-Uighur language, and the term “Uighur,” the transcription we use in this report, is found in a variety of other spellings, including Uygur, Uyghur, and Weigur. In Chinese, the name is transliterated as Weiwu’er [维吾尔]. People’s names also differ markedly, depending on whether the original name is in Uighur, in Chinese transliteration, or in the abbreviated form used in official documents. Thus, for example, the Uighur name Abdulkerim is transliterated in Chinese as Ahbudoukelimu [阿布都克里木], but will appear as Abudou [阿布都] in official documents. Places have different names in Chinese than in indigenous languages. Thus the city of Yining [伊宁] is called Ghulja in Uighur, and Hetian [和田] is known as Khotan.

For the sake of uniform orthography and wider recognition, this report has adopted the official Chinese transliteration of place names in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region, which we refer to simply as “Xinjiang.”

[1] Wang Lequan: [Xinjiang] will deal devastating blows to ethnic separatist forces,” China News Agency, January 14, 2003 [王乐泉：将给与民族分裂势力以毁灭性打击， 中国新闻社，2003年1月14日].

[2] State Council (Order N. 426), Regulations of Religious Affairs, promulgated November 30, 2004, effective March 1, 2005 [中华人民共和国国务院令（第４２６号）,宗教事务条例, 2004 年11月30, 2005 年３月１日起施行], [online], http://www.china.org.cn/chinese/2004/Dec/732346.htm (retrieved February 14, 2005)].

[3] See Human Rights in China and See Human Rights Watch/Asia (joint report), "Whose Security? ‘State Security’ in China's New Criminal Code," A Human Rights Watch Report, vol. 9, no. 4, April 1997.

II. Background

Located in the farthest northwest corner of China, Xinjiang was first formally incorporated into the Chinese empire in 1884. Bordered by eight central Asian countries, in many ways it remains a remote outpost of the People’s Republic of China, lagging in many socio-economic indicators and sharing few cultural or historical ties with Beijing. 

Xinjiang is the only Chinese province or “autonomous” region with a Muslim majority. Indeed, along with Tibet it is the only administrative region in China in which ethnic Chinese still constitute a minority. 

The non-Chinese population of Xinjiang of approximately nine million is almost entirely Muslim. The overwhelming majority of this group, approximately eight million, are Uighurs.

Chinese domination of Xinjiang has never been fully accepted. This is particularly true among Uighurs. A major source of tension has been the large migration of ethnic Chinese to Xinjiang, which many non-Chinese believe has had disastrous effects on local culture, language, and traditions. Many non-Chinese say that as a result they fear being overrun culturally, economically, and politically by ethnic Chinese. Many assert that this is the aim of Chinese state policy. 

To understand the way that China has attempted to equate independent Uighur culture and religion with separatism, and by extension with “terrorism,” it is useful to understand the history of the region. The following summary includes a study of China’s efforts to economically integrate the area, the role of Islam in Uighur identity, and instances of violent resistance to Chinese rule and government crackdowns.

The political identity of Xinjiang

The ancestors of the Uighur people were most likely nomadic tribes originating from Mongolia who settled in the oases of the Tarim basin (the southern half of Xinjiang) around the seventh century. They were gradually converted to Islam from the tenth to the seventeenth century. The region was formally annexed to the Manchu Qing Empire in 1759, but effective control was loose due to the numerous uprisings that regularly shook the region. From 1866 to 1876, Xinjiang was under the rule of the Kashgar-based warlord Yakub Beg, before being reconquered in 1877 by the Qing troops and integrated formally into the empire as their “New Dominion,” Xinjiang [新疆], in 1884. The fall of the Qing Empire in 1911 opened an era of rule by competing local warlords.

In 1944, a Soviet-backed independent East Turkestan Republic (ETR) was set up in the three western districts of Yili, Tacheng, and Ashan, with Yining as the capital. In 1947, it joined in a formal government with the nationalist forces controlling the rest of Xinjiang.

As the outcome of the Chinese civil war turned to the advantage of the Chinese Communists, Stalin, who had little interest in supporting a Muslim nationalist regime in the backyard of his own Central Asian Soviet republics, pressed for negotiations between the East Turkestan Republic and the Chinese Communist Party for a peaceful takeover of Xinjiang. The plane carrying the East Turkestan representatives on their way to Beijing in August 1949 for the negotiations crashed, killing all the occupants in circumstances that have led to widespread suspicion. This removed the local nationalist leaders from the scene and made way for the incorporation of Xinjiang into the newly born People’s Republic of China.

Beijing immediately started a policy of large-scale migration into the region, and the proportion of ethnic Chinese increased from 6 percent in 1949 to 41.5 percent by the time of Mao’s death in 1976. The relative liberalization of the 1980s initiated by Deng Xiaoping’s “Opening and Reform” allowed for greater autonomy for Xinjiang. This included respect for certain cultural and religious practices. Ancient mosques were restored and new ones built, cultural traditions that had gone underground resurfaced, and individual economic activities were tolerated again. The number of Chinese cadre and personnel stationed in Xinjiang began to decrease, and by the end of the 1980s, the share of the Chinese population had dropped to 37.5 percent. In the 1990s, however, through a combination of economic and land ownership incentives, Beijing engineered a rapid acceleration of the ethnic Chinese influx to Xinjiang. About 1.2 million people settled in Xinjiang during the decade, pushing the proportion of the ethnic Chinese population to 40 percent of the total of some 18.5 million people at present.⁴

Ethnic Chinese migrants have tended to benefit from the economic development of Xinjiang to a far greater degree than Uighurs, a source of much tension. Profound socio-economic disparities between Uighurs and Chinese are reflected in the fact that the former have on average about ten years less life expectancy than the Chinese settlers in the region.⁵

Uighur Islam

The Uighurs have long practiced a moderate, traditional form of Sunni Islam, strongly infused with the folklore and traditions of a rural, oasis-dwelling population. Today most Uighurs still live in rural communities, although large cities have emerged in the region. Their history as commercial and cultural brokers between the different people connected by the Silk Road (through which Buddhism was introduced to China from India two millennia ago) gave rise to a markedly tolerant and open version of Muslim faith and a rich intellectual tradition of literature, science, and music. Nineteenth-century travelers to Kashgar noted that women enjoyed many freedoms, such as the right to initiate divorce and run businesses on their own

Sufism, a deeply mystical tradition of Islam revolving around the cult of particular saints and transmitted from master to disciples, has also had a long historical presence in Xinjiang. In daily life, Islam represents a source of personal and social values, and provides a vocabulary for talking about aspirations and grievances. The imam is traditionally a mediator and a moderator of village life, and performs many social functions as well as religious ones. 

As the borders of Xinjiang became more porous in the 1980s, a number of young Uighurs went clandestinely to Pakistan to receive the religious education they could not obtain under China’s policies. Upon their return, they enjoyed great prestige due to their ventures abroad and their knowledge of Koranic theology, far beyond that typical among local imams. Small-scale, localized underground religious organizations started to emerge. A long history of tension and opposition to Chinese domination already existed (see below). In this period it began to take on an Islamic color. 

There is no evidence that Salafism, the radical Islamic ideology connected to many jihadist movements around the world, has taken root to any significant extent in Xinjiang. Proponents of rebellion against Chinese rule have used the vocabulary of Islam and religious grievances against Beijing to justify their actions. These are not, however, mainstream views.

Recent reports suggest that Hizb ut-Tahrir (Party of Liberation), a movement which advocates the establishment of a pan-Central Asian caliphate and whose headquarters is located in London, has recently made inroads in Southern Xinjiang, but it has so far never advocated violence. Hizb ut-Tahrir is the object of rigorous repression in Uzbekistan and other Central Asian countries. It remains illegal in China.

A history of restiveness

There has long been strong Uighur objection to Chinese rule in Xinjiang. In the middle of the twentieth century, as noted above, the western part of the region enjoyed independence as the Soviet-aligned East Turkestan Republic and effective control by China was not achieved until shortly after the establishment of the communist state in 1949. As a result, memories of a distinct political and administrative identity are strong in certain areas and among certain sections of the community.

A pan-Turkic ideology inspired the brief life of the modern independent state and, today, the political views of various Uighur groups based in Central Asia or farther afield in Turkey, Germany, and even the United States, remain mainly of pan-Turkic inspiration. These organizations in most cases have secular and democratic aspirations. They come from conventional political traditions and have not supported the use of violence for their objectives, whether for the achievement of “real autonomy” or “independence” for the country they still call East Turkestan. In Xinjiang itself, no unified movement has surfaced. In fact, for reasons of language, geography, and religion (Xinjiang's different Muslim ethnic groups of Kazakhs, Mongols, Tajiks, Chinese-speaking Hui, and Uighurs have distinct places of worship––Hui Mosques, Uighur Mosques, etc.), this is complicated and unlikely. Even if the groups themselves had the will to join forces, Chinese restrictions on freedom of assembly, the formation of independent organizations, and the publication or circulation of political and cultural materials would make it all but impossible for these groups to acquire a broad base of support or to take on any collective form. No opposition groups are allowed to exist in any public form.

However, a number of small opposition groups are known to exist secretly.⁶ They tend to gravitate around two geographic poles: Yining and the Yili valley, in the western part of Xinjiang close to the border with Kazakhstan, and Kashgar and Hetian, in southern Xinjiang. The opposition groups that are present in the southern part of Xinjiang, notably in the Kashgar and Hetian areas, are thought to be more oriented towards the incorporation of religious ideals within their political programs. Some small groups have advocated the establishment of an Islamic state in Xinjiang and reject Chinese sovereignty.

 

The pro-independence groups in Xinjiang are overwhelmingly ethno-nationalist movements––that is, they are articulated along ethnic lines, not religious ones. This appears to be the case among both religious and secular groups.

The turning point––unrest in 1990, stricter controls from Beijing

In 1990 a major, Islamic-inspired insurrection in Baren county, northwest of Kashgar, led China to launch a long-term strategy to assert tighter control over Uighur society. Until then, Xinjiang had remained a distant indigenous periphery. But for Beijing this challenge to the state was the turning point in its policies towards the Uighurs and Xinjiang.

China’s reaction was linked to major changes in regional and world politics: the loss of control by Moscow of its eastern European satellites and the imminent collapse of the Soviet Union and emergence of the new central Asian republics. China feared that Uighur ethno-nationalist aspirations in Xinjiang could be stirred up by the example of––and possible support from––the newly independent central Asian people across its borders.

Beijing then launched an ambitious plan to accelerate the integration of Xinjiang with China by stepping up ethnic Chinese migration to Xinjiang. At the same time, it committed major resources to economic growth in Xinjiang, chiefly through the exploitation of Xinjiang's natural resources, above all oil and gas. These policies coincided with impressive economic growth in China, which made it possible to commit the capital and labor to carry them out. This led to tremendous changes in Xinjiang, as new roads, industries, cities, and waves of new migration ensued. The political calculus in Beijing was straightforward: in the 1990s many Chinese policy makers took the view that economic development reduces local nationalism and aids national integration. The transfer of ethnic Chinese labor was and is still seen widely in Chinese policy making circles as aiding political integration and ultimately removing reasons for political unrest. These polices in fact may have exacerbated political tensions because of a predictable local reaction to mass migration and the fact that many of the economic gains were unevenly distributed and favored the Han segment of the population. Uighurs felt increasingly marginalized and left behind.

These tensions became evident in February 1997 when a number of residents of Yining, a town fifty kilometers from the Kazakh border, staged a demonstration to protest Chinese policies in Xinjiang, in particular, restrictions on religious and cultural activities, as well as the migration of Chinese settlers to the region. The protesters requested that the provisions of the legislative autonomy regulations that govern all ethnic minority regions in China be respected. These guarantee the right of minority nationality populations to set up “organs of self-government,” as well as to retain some control over their local affairs and economic resources.⁷

The protest was peaceful. However, the security forces, composed of the Public Security Bureau and the People’s Armed Police, brutally put down the protest and shot a number of unarmed demonstrators. Three days of rioting followed. This led to further harsh reactions by the authorities. Casualty figures for the Yining riots vary depending on the source, but a conservative estimate suggests that nine people died and hundreds were injured.

In subsequent weeks, the authorities responded with arrests of thousands of Uighurs. Suspected activists were rounded up and public sentencing rallies were held across the region. The government also instituted new, far-reaching policies focused on religion as a supposed source of opposition. Mosques and religious schools were closed down.

A month later, in March 1997, separatists detonated bombs simultaneously on three public buses in the provincial capital of Urumqi, killing nine and seriously wounding sixty-eight. This is the only known occasion in recent decades when Uighur activists are known to have attacked civilians indiscriminately. Subsequently, attacks were also carried out on police stations, military installations, and individual political leaders.

Among the actions attributed to separatist forces include the August 1998 wounding of a prison official in Kashgar by a booby trap package placed on his doorstep. Also in August 1998 two prisons in Yining prefecture were attacked by an armed group. Nine prison guards were killed; eighty prisoners managed to escape. Eighteen prisoners allegedly managed to flee to Kazakhstan according to the Hong Kong daily newspaper Ming Pao.⁸ Despite the indisputably violent character of these incidents, government claims that the 1990s witnessed an escalation of violence are not accepted by all independent observers. For instance, the historian and Xinjiang expert James Millward writes that:

Although the relatively few large-scale incidents in the 1990s were better publicized than those of the 1980s, they were not necessarily bigger or more threatening to the state. There have been, moreover, few incidents of anti-state violence––none large-scale––since early 1998. And none of them since the 1997 Urumqi bus bombings, alleged to be the work of Uighur terrorists, have targeted civilians.⁹

Post 9/11: labeling Uighurs terrorists

Although the Xinjiang authorities began to publicly acknowledge anti-state violence in Xinjiang in the mid-1990s, they generally suggested that it was carried out only by “a handful of separatists” and stressed that the region was stable and prosperous. In early September 2001, the Xinjiang authorities had stressed that “by no means is Xinjiang a place where violence and terrorist accidents take place very often,” and that the situation there was “better than ever in history.” ¹⁰

However, immediately after the September 11 attacks on the United States, the authorities reversed their stance. For the first time they asserted that opposition in Xinjiang was connected to international terrorism. They also asserted that in some cases the movement had connections to Osama bin Laden himself. China claimed that “Osama bin Laden and the Taliban in Afghanistan had provided the ‘Eastern Turkestan’ terrorist organizations with equipment and financial resources and trained their personnel,” and that one particular organization, the “Eastern Turkestan Islamic Movement” (ETIM) was a “major component of the terrorist network headed by Osama bin Laden.”¹¹

 

By October the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman declared that, as “a victim of international terrorism,” China hoped that “efforts to fight against East Turkestan terrorist forces should become a part of the international efforts and should also win support and understanding.”¹²

On November 12, 2001, China told the U.N. Security Council that anti-state Uighur groups had links with the Taliban in Afghanistan and claimed that they were supported from abroad by radical Islamist organizations. Siding with the U.S. in the new “global war against terrorism,” the Chinese government initiated an active diplomatic and propaganda campaign against “East Turkestan terrorist forces.” This label was henceforth to be applied indiscriminately to any Uighur suspected of separatist activities. There has been no sign of any attempt by the Chinese authorities to distinguish between peaceful political activists, peaceful separatists, and those advocating or using violence.

In its efforts to win support for its post-September 11 equation of Uighur separatism with international terrorism, China has released a number of documents describing in some detail the alleged activities of Uighur terrorists groups in China. The first of these was published by the Information Office of the PRC State Council in January 2002, under the title: “East Turkestan Terrorist Forces Cannot Get Away with Impunity.” ¹³ It offers the most comprehensive account to date of anti-state violence in Xinjiang and provides a catalog of violent acts allegedly committed by separatist groups in Xinjiang over the past decade. The document asserts that “East Turkestan terrorist forces” had conducted “a campaign of bombing and assassinations” consisting of more than 200 incidents resulting in 162 deaths and 440 people injured over the preceding decade.¹⁴ This was the first time the Chinese authorities provided detailed specifics about violence in Xinjiang. The document also asserted that Uighur organizations responsible for the violence had received training and funding from Pakistan and Afghanistan, including direct financing from Osama bin Laden himself.¹⁵

 

The document has a highly charged ideological tone and contains numerous inconsistencies. It also lacks any independent intelligence to support its conclusions.¹⁶ In particular, the central claim that all instances of anti-state violence, and all “separatist groups,” originated from a single “East Turkestan terrorist organization” runs counter to known intelligence about the situation in Xinjiang. Even more problematic are the inconsistencies in the account of specific acts of violence within the document itself.

Human Rights Watch has no way of corroborating or disproving the incidents alleged in the January 2002 report. But as James Millward has written in his monograph, Violent Separatism in Xinjiang: A Critical Assessment:

[There] are problems in the document’s treatment of events in the 1990s. While its preface claims that terrorist acts killed 162 (and injured 440) over the past decade, the document itself enumerates only 57 deaths. Most of these people died in small-scale incidents with only one or two victims. The selection criteria for including these incidents, as well as many that resulted in no deaths, while excluding acts that led to the remaining 105 deaths are unclear. But if we are safe in assuming that the document likely mentions all spectacular acts of separatist violence, including those involving high loss of life, then we are left to conclude that over a hundred deaths from “terrorism”––nearly two-thirds the claimed total––occurred in small-scale or even individual attacks. Though definitions of terrorism are notoriously arbitrary, it seems legitimate to question what makes the unlisted acts “terrorist” or “separatist” as opposed to simply criminal.¹⁷

In December 2003, the Chinese government released a second report designed to legitimize its policies in Xinjiang and to enlist the support of the international community. The document listing “East Turkestan terrorist groups and individuals” was issued by the Ministry of Public Security and gave the names of four “Eastern Turkestan” terrorist organizations and eleven individual members of these groups, and called for international support to stop their activities, including a request for Interpol to issue arrest warrants.¹⁸ The document points to the presence of Chinese Uighurs in Pakistan and Afghanistan, including some among the Taliban forces. It suggests that all Uighur opposition to Chinese domination, including non-violent resistance, is connected to international radical-Islamic terrorism.

Literature becomes sabotage

Chinese authorities have not produced extensive evidence of specific activities carried out by what it has termed “terrorist forces” in Xinjiang over the past few years. Instead, Chinese authorities now argue that “separatist thought” is the new approach followed by dissident organizations that previously used violent tactics. This argument allows the authorities to accuse a dissenting writer or a non-violent group advocating minority rights of terrorist intentions and crimes.

The alleged link between terrorist organizations and the ideological content of publications surfaced immediately after September 11:

“Xinjiang independence elements have changed their combat tactics since the September 11 incident,” stated a high-ranking Xinjiang official. “They have focused on attacking China on the ideological front instead of using their former frequent practice of engaging in violent terrorist operations.”¹⁹

The official charged that those using “literary means” and “arts and literature” to “distort historical facts” were the same people responsible for “violent terrorist operations” in the

past. He accused them of “taking advantage of art and literature to tout the products of opposition to the people and to the masses and of advocating ethnic splittist thinking.”

In February 2002, the Xinjiang Party Secretary instructed the local authorities to crack down on these “separatist techniques” and detailed the “forms of infiltration and sabotage carried out in the ideological sphere by ethnic separatist forces”:²⁰

1. using all sorts of news media to propagate separatist thought;

2. using periodicals, works of literature and art performances; presenting the subject in satires or allegories that give free reign to and disseminate dissatisfaction and propagate separatist thought;

3. illegally printing reactionary books and periodicals; distributing or posting reactionary leaflets, letters and posters; spreading rumors to confuse the people; instilling the public with separatist sentiment;

4. using audio and video recordings, such as audio tapes, CDs or VCDs, to incite religious fanaticism and promote “holy war”;

5. forging alliances with outside separatist and enemy forces, making use of broadcasts, the Internet, and other means to intensify campaigns of reactionary propaganda and infiltration of ideas into public opinion;

6. using popular cultural activities to make the masses receptive to reactionary propaganda encouraging opposition.”²¹

From the wording of the document, published in the Party’s official newspaper, the Xinjiang Daily, it appears that Xinjiang authorities equate any expression of dissatisfaction (buman qingxu 不满情绪), even metaphorical or ironical, with separatist thought (fenlie sixiang 分裂思想). The term “spreading rumors” (zaoyao 造谣) used in the article is the same as that used in criminal law: “incitement to subvert the political power of the state and overthrow the socialist system by means of spreading rumors, slander or other means” (Article 105), an offense for which the punishment can be life imprisonment. The document asserts that the “expression of dissatisfaction” in works of art is a form of criminal activity and is liable to criminal punishment. Furthermore, the document uses the terms “sabotage” and “infiltration” to characterize such activities, thus reinforcing the idea that they are equivalent to violent action.

The fact that “popular cultural activities” (minjian wenhua huodong 民间文化活动) are denounced as forms of “separatist” activity appears to be aimed at deterring people from engaging in activities that promote their history, culture, or tradition. Ethnic minority individuals and Uighur organizations abroad had complained in the past about similar official attitudes toward legitimate cultural pursuits, but prior to this official pronouncement their allegations had only been supported by circumstantial evidence, not stated explicitly as high-level Party policy.²²

Such comments indicate that the Chinese authorities are trying to erase the distinctions among cultural and minority rights activists, pro-independence activists, and those who use violence. This suggests an historical shift: while before September 11, 2001, not all minority rights or cultural rights activists or those on the “ideological front” (which presumably covers all critics of CCP policy) were considered to be terrorists, after September 11 they are, or should be, assumed to be terrorists.  

In effect, China is claiming that terrorists have now become secret peaceful activists, presumably waiting for the right moment to revert to their former methods. This is a very dangerous set of assumptions that can be acted upon by the Chinese or Xinjiang security services at any time to justify arrests, heavy sentences, and the death penalty. 

The case of Tursunjan Emet, a Uighur poet from Urumqi, illustrates this point. On January 1, 2002, Emet recited a poem in Uighur at the end of a concert at the Xinjiang People’s Hall in the capital Urumqi. The Party committee ruled that the poem had an “anti-government” message and labeled the case as an “ethnic separatist crime in the area of the ideological front.”²³ The Chairman of the Xinjiang provincial government immediately called for an investigation, vowing to purge all who “openly advocate separatism using the name of art,” and urged cadres to use “politics” as the only standard in judging artistic and literary work. Emet went into hiding immediately after the incident. He was then detained, probably in late January 2002.²⁴ Official Chinese sources have since denied that he was ever detained. Unofficial sources indicate that he was released, some weeks, or possibly months, later.²⁵

In a similar case, on February 2, 2005, the Kashgar Intermediate Court sentenced Uighur author Nurmemet Yasin to ten years imprisonment for publishing a story allegedly “inciting separatism.” In late 2004, Yasin published “The Blue Pigeon” in the Kashgar Literature Journal.²⁶ A month later, he was arrested in Bachu County. His story told of a blue pigeon that traveled far from home. When it returned, different colored pigeons captured him and locked him in a birdcage. Although the other pigeons fed him, the blue pigeon opted to commit suicide rather than remain imprisoned in his hometown.

In part because pro-independence Uighurs use a blue flag, Chinese authorities read the story as referring to Uighur resentment of the government’s policies in Xinjiang. The court tried Yasin in closed hearings; RFA sources claimed he was denied access to a lawyer.

It is therefore now official policy that criticism or minority expression in art and literature can be deemed a disguised form of secessionism, its author a criminal or even “terrorist.”

The international response––acquiescence and quid pro quos

The new Chinese description of the nature and level of violence and separatism in Xinjiang led to a significant change in the international approach to Xinjiang. The U.S. government, keen after September 11 to enlist Chinese support in its efforts against Islamist terrorism, agreed to a Chinese request that it co-sponsor the inclusion of a little-known Uighur organization, the East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM), on the U.N.’s list of terrorist organizations purportedly linked to al-Qaeda and subject to the freezing of assets. Although American officials declared that they had “independent evidence” of such a connection, the State Department press release explaining this decision quoted verbatim a document issued by the Chinese government in 2002 that similarly outlawed ETIM. The U.S. statement even mistakenly attributed all the terrorist incidents described in that document solely to ETIM, a claim that even the Chinese authorities had not made.²⁷

The “independent evidence” referred to by the State Department appears to have originated from the arrest a few weeks earlier in Kyrgyzstan of a group of Uighurs who were allegedly planning an attack on the U.S. embassy.²⁸ Kyrgyzstan deported to China two persons alleged to be ETIM members who had “plotted to attack the U.S. Embassy in Kyrgyzstan as well as other U.S. interests abroad.”²⁹ In their rush to find corroborative evidence, U.S. officials seem never to have questioned the reports from Kyrgyz authorities, who have a record of trumping up terrorism charges against Uighurs. U.S. officials have privately indicated unease at the decision to list ETIM. In December 2003 the U.S. declined to support China's request to list another Uighur organization, the East Turkestan Liberation Organization.³⁰

The U.S. has also publicly insisted that the ETIM listing and the international war on terror should not be used by China to justify internal repression against political opponents or minorities. President Bush stressed in October 2001 in Shanghai that, “The war on terrorism must never be an excuse to persecute minorities.”³¹ U.S. Ambassador Clark Randt similarly stated in January 2002 that “Being a valuable member of the coalition does not mean that China… can use terrorism as an excuse to persecute its ethnic minorities.”³² However, the U.S. has not withdrawn or formally qualified its condemnation of the ETIM from the U.N. list. In the process, it has handed China a major propaganda victory against its political opponents in Xinjiang. 

China has also been very active in enrolling the support of its Central Asian neighbors in the crackdown against Uighur ethno-nationalist aspirations. It is the driving force behind the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), a regional security body composed of China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan set up in 1996 (Uzbekistan joined in 2001). The SCO was established in part to address Chinese concerns about a number of small Uighur political and opposition movements that, in the first years of independence for the former Soviet republics, set up organizations in the region, giving Uighur exiles a much closer base for their operations than the previous generation of activists, who had been based in Turkey and, later, Germany. Under pressure from Beijing, since 1996 these Central Asian countries have effectively silenced independent Uighur organizations on their soil and on several occasions have repatriated refugees in response to requests by China. Some of those repatriated refugees were executed upon their return.³³

Since the co-option by China and other states of the notion of the “war against terror,” international co-operation has been leveraged in the Central Asian region by means of mutual agreement about those regarded by these states as political opponents. These cases have not always involved activists involved in the use of violence. In October 2004, China and Russia made a joint call for international efforts to help in their respective fights against opponents, with the Russians seeking help against Chechen rebels and the Chinese seeking help against Uighur separatists. The statement referred to “terrorists” and “separatists” in Chechnya and Xinjiang, whom it said “are part of international terrorism” and “should be the targets of the international fight against terrorism.”³⁴ The wording of the Chinese part of the statement referred both to terrorism and separatism, but implied that they were interchangeable:

China understands and firmly supports all measures taken by Russia to resume the constitutional order of the Republic of Chechnya and to fight against terrorism. Russia firmly supports all measures taken by China to fight against the terrorist and separatist forces in “East Turkestan” and to eliminate terrorist jeopardy.³⁵

The Kazakh government acknowledged in November 2004 that it had extradited fourteen Uighurs to China and Kyrgyzstan since 1997.³⁶ Pakistan has boasted that it has eliminated Uighur “terrorists” in its northern areas.³⁷ Beijing has also pressured Pakistan and Nepal for the repatriation of refugees. In January 2002, Nepal forcibly repatriated three Uighurs who had been granted refugee status by the UNHCR and were awaiting relocation to a third country.³⁸ One of them, Shaheer Ali, was executed shortly thereafter after being convicted for separatism. He left a detailed account of torture inflicted on him in Chinese jails before his death.³⁹

China has asked the United States to send to China the twenty-two or twenty-three Chinese Uighurs held at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba.⁴⁰ The detainees had allegedly been fighting alongside Taliban forces in Afghanistan at the time of the U.S. invasion, and were arrested by Pakistani authorities when fleeing into Pakistan when the U.S. offensive against the Taliban started. Despite the fact that the Pentagon ascertained that these prisoners had “no intelligence value,” a Chinese mission was reportedly permitted to interrogate the prisoners at the Guantanamo detention facility.⁴¹ Following reports in December 2003 that the U.S. was about to release some of the Uighurs without charge, and was considering handing them over to China,⁴² Human Rights Watch and others raised concerns over Chinese authorities’ track record of swiftly executing repatriated “separatists.”⁴³ The first reports that the U.S. government had ruled out return to China because of the risk that the Uighurs might be tortured or executed appeared in June 2004.⁴⁴ In August 2004, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell declared publicly that the U.S. would not return the Uighurs.⁴⁵ The Chinese embassy in Washington continues to press for their repatriation. It has declared that Beijing considers the Uighurs at Guantanamo to be “East Turkestan terrorists” who should be returned to China.⁴⁶

While there are genuine security concerns in Xinjiang, they are manipulated by Chinese authorities for political and economic ends. When it is expedient, the authorities insist that only “an extremely small number of elements” are engaged in separatism and that the situation is “stable.” In March 2005, the head of the Xinjiang government, Ismail Tiwaldi, confirmed that “there have been no terror attacks in Xinjiang in recent years," thus corroborating his statement of the previous year that “Xinjiang ha[d] not recorded a single violent incident, nor any assassination case [in 2004],” and that “there hadn’t been even a small incident,” throughout 2003.⁴⁷ When, however, the government desires international support for its crackdown on Uighur challenges to Chinese authority, including peaceful activities, it raises the specter of Islamic terrorism.

[4] "Analysis of the characteristics of population migrations in the western regions during the 1990s," Social Science Review, vol. 19, no. 2, April 2004, pp. 14-15 [90年代中后期西部地区千亿人口特征分析， 科学纵横，2004年4月 （总第19卷第2期）， 14-15页].The Chinese authorities have consistently refused to acknowledge publicly any influx of migrants from interior China into Xinjiang.

[5] The 1990 national census showed that the mortality of ethnic minorities in Xinjiang was 3.6 times higher than for the Han population. Life expectancy was 61.62, against 71.4 for the Han population and 70 for China overall (“The quality and labor situation of the population from Xinjiang ethnic minorities,” Journal of Xinjiang University, September 1999, vol. 7, no. 3 [新疆少数民族人口的素质与就业, 新疆大学学报, 1999年9月第7卷第3期]).

[6] James Millward, Violent Separatism in Xinjiang: A Critical Assessment (Policy Studies No. 6), (Washington DC: East-West Center Washington, 2004), [online] http://www.eastwestcenter.org/res-rp-publicationdetails.asp?pub_ID=1479.

[7] Law of the People's Republic of China on Regional National Autonomy, 1984 [中华人民共和国民族区域自治]. The law was amended in 2001. See “National autonomy law revised to support Western Development policy,” Tibetan Information Network, March 13, 2001.

[8] Human Rights Watch, “China: Human Rights Concerns in Xinjiang,” A Human Rights Watch Backgrounder, October 2001, [online], http://www.hrw.org/backgrounder/asia/china-bck1017.htm.

[9] Millward, Violent Separatism in Xinjiang, p. 10.

[10] Bao Lisheng, “Chinese Officials Say Not Much Terrorism in Xinjiang,” Ta Kung Pao, September 2, 2001 (in Chinese).

[11] “Terrorist Activities Perpetrated by ‘Eastern Turkestan’ Organizations and Their Links with Osama bin Laden and the Taliban,” November 21, 2001, posted on the official website of the Permanent Mission of the People’s Republic of China to the United Nations, [online] http://www.china-un.org/eng/zt/fk/t28937.htm (retrieved October 5, 2003).

[12] “China Asks Help Against Muslims,” Associated Press, October 11, 2001.

[13] “East Turkestan' Terrorist Forces Cannot Get Away with Impunity,” January 21, 2002, issued by the State Council Information Office, [online] http://www.china-un.ch/eng/23949.html. [国务院新闻办，“东突”恐怖势力难脱罪责,”2002年1月21日, http://news.sohu.com/74/76/news147717674.shtml].

[14] Ibid.

[15] Ibid.

[16] For a detailed analysis of the problems of the January 2002 StateCouncilInformationCenter report, see James Millward, Violent Separatism in Xinjiang.

[17] Millward, Violent Separatism in Xinjiang, pp. 12-13.

[18] “Combating terrorism, we have no choice,” People’s Daily Online, December 18, 2003. The identified "Eastern Turkestan" terrorist organizations were the Eastern Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM), the Eastern Turkestan Liberation Organization (ETLO), the World Uighur Youth Congress (WUYC), and the EasternTurkestanInformationCenter (ETIC).

[19] China News Agency, March 13, 2002, FBIS, March 25, 2002. [CHI-2002-0313].

[20] “For the first time Xinjiang reveals the six forms of sabotaging operations of the separatist forces in the ideological sphere,” Xinjiang Information Network, February 1, 2002 [“新疆首次披露民族分裂势力在意识形态领域破坏活动的六种形式,” 新疆新闻网, 2002-02-01].

[21] Ibid.

[22] “Separatist Artist under Watch,” South China Morning Post, January 15, 2002.

[23] Ibid; China News Agency, March 13, 2002, FBIS, March 25, 2002 [CHI-2002-0313].

[24] “Surge in Arrests and Prosecutions for Endangering State Security,” Newsletter of the Dui Hua Foundation, Issue 11, Spring 2003.

[25] Amnesty International, “People’s Republic of China: Uighurs fleeing persecution as China wages its ‘war on terror’,” July 7, 2004 [AI Index: ASA 17/021/2004].

[26] Radio Free Asia Uighur Service, February 8, 2005, [online] http://origin.rfaweb.org/yughur/xewerler/tepsili_xewer/2005/02/08/orkish..., (retrieved February 10, 2005).

[27] See “Criminalizing Ethnicity: Political Repression in Xinjiang,” China Rights Forum, no. 1, 2004.

[28] “U.S. has Evidence ETIM Plans Attack,” People’s Daily Online, August 30, 2002.

[29] U.S. Department of State, Patterns of Global Terrorism 2002, [online] http://www.state.gov/s/ct/rls/pgtrpt/.

[30] “China seeks co-op worldwide to fight ‘East Turkestan’ terrorists,” Xinhua News Service, December 15, 2003.

[31] “U.S., China Stand Against Terrorism: Remarks by President Bush and President Jiang Zemin,” press conference at the Western Suburb Guest House in Shanghai, People's Republic of China), [online] http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2001/10/20011019-4.html.

[32] “United States-China Relations in the Wake of 9-11,” speech by Ambassador Clark T. Randt, Jr., United States Ambassador to China, The Asia Society, Hong Kong, January 21, 2002, [online] http://www.asiasociety.org/speeches/randt2.html.

[33] Amnesty International, “People’s Republic of China: Uighurs fleeing persecution as China wages its ‘war on terror,’” July 7, 2004 [AI Index: ASA 17/021/2004].

[34] “Leaders unite in terrorism stand,” South China Morning Post, October 15, 200; Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the PRC: “China and Russia Issue a Joint Statement, Declaring the Trend of the Boundary Line between the Two Countries Has Been Completely Determined,” October 14, 2004 (available on the website of the ministry at www.fmprc.gov.cn).

[35] Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the PRC: “China and Russia Issue a Joint Statement, Declaring the Trend of the Boundary Line between the Two Countries Has Been Completely Determined,” October 14, 2004, [online] www.fmprc.gov.cn.

[36] “Kazakhstan Reveals Uighur Extraditions,” Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, November 16, 2004.

[37] Human Rights Watch interview with senior Pakistani intelligence official, February 2004. To protect the confidentiality of sources, we have removed potentially identifying details from citations to interviews we conducted in Xinjiang and elsewhere, including the specific date and in some cases the location of the interview.

[38] Amnesty International, “Urgent Action Appeal: Fear of forcible return,” April 22, 2002, [UA 119/02].

[39] “Executed Uighur refugee left torture testimony behind,” Radio Free Asia, October 23, 2003. Shaheer Ali spoke to RFA’s Uighur Service in May 2001, describing eight months of torture from April to December of 1994 in the Old Market Prison, in Guma (in Chinese, Pishan) county, in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region. In several Human Rights Watch interviews conducted by telephone from Nepal, Shirali described how he was beaten with shackles, shocked in an electric chair, repeatedly kicked unconscious, and then drenched in cold water to revive him for more torture.

[40] Demitri Sevastopuolo, “U.S. fails to find homes for Uighur detainees,” Financial Times, October 28, 2004.

[41] “US fails to find homes for Uighur detainees,” The Financial Times, October 28, 2004.

[42] “Eleven Turks at Guantanamo base,” United Press International, February 6, 2004.

[43] “U.S.: Don’t Send Detainees Back to China,” Human Rights Watch, November 26, 2003, [online] http://www.hrw.org/press/2003/11/us112603.htm.

[44] “China torture fears hamper jail releases,” The Financial Times, June 22, 2004.

[45] "Powell Says Detained Uighurs Will not be Returned to China," Agence France-Presse, August 13, 2004].

[46] “US fails to find homes for Uighur detainees,” The Financial Times, October 28, 2004.

[47] "Head of China's northwest Muslim Xinjiang region says area safe from terror attacks," Associated Press, March 13, 2005 ; “Xinjiang confident of reining in rebels,” South China Morning Post, March 13, 2004.

III. National Law and Policy on Religion

We will never allow the use of religion to oppose the Party’s leadership and the socialist system or undermine the unification of the state and unity among various nationalities.⁴⁸

On its face, China’s 1982 constitution guarantees freedom of religion. Article 36 states:

Citizens of the People’s Republic of China enjoy freedom of religious belief. No state organ, public organization or individual may compel citizens to believe in, or not to believe in, any religion; nor may they discriminate against citizens who believe in, or do not believe in any religion.

The state protects normal religious activities. No one may make use of religion to engage in activities that disrupt public order, impair the health of citizens or interfere with the educational system of the state. Religious bodies and religious affairs are not subject to any foreign domination.⁴⁹

This ambiguous formulation does not answer many questions about what is permissible and what is not. More important is the policy of the Chinese Communist Party on religion, which dates from the leadership of Deng Xiaoping, who reversed the Mao-era policy of attempting to eradicate religion from society.

The essence of current CCP policy is to tolerate religious beliefs and practices that do not threaten the Party or state but to closely regulate and, where it is deemed necessary, aggressively repress beliefs and practices perceived as a threat.⁵⁰ In practice, since the late 1970s China has allowed believers greater latitude for worship in exchange for accepting a regulatory structure designed to limit church autonomy and stifle congregational growth.⁵¹

The most recent national policy parameters on religion were established at the National Conference on Religious Work, convened jointly by the Chinese Communist Party Central Committee and the State Council in December 2000. The conference articulated four fundamental principles that underlie regulation of religion in China today.

The first principle is “freedom to believe or not believe in religion.” This principle reflects both the toleration of individual belief and its essential isolation from other social activities. It allows non-threatening forms of religious observance to be carried out within approved temples, churches, or mosques, and at home. Conversely, it is also invoked to curtail any form of proselytization and to prohibit religious observance at all state-managed institutions such as schools, universities, government offices, state-owned enterprises, prisons, and labor-camps. 

The second principle, of “non-interference in religious activities,” refers to the fact that only state-controlled religious organizations can organize and implement religious activities. Links to foreign religious institutions are proscribed.

The third principle of “separation of politics from religion” effectively prohibits critical commentary by religious figures or followers and frequently is invoked to justify government crackdowns on religious expression or dissent.

The final principle, of “the interdependence between rights and obligations associated with religious activities,” inserts conditionality into the exercise of religious freedom. Religious activities are deemed “lawful” only when practitioners fulfill a fixed set of conditions (the “obligations”).

For those trying to practice religion in China, the critical issue is to determine what constitutes “legitimate and protected belief” and what crosses the line into “unlawful activity.” As one legal scholar has stressed, “this determination is made according to [Chinese Communist Party] policies, which in turn are reflected in the provisions of the constitution and in specific laws and regulations.”⁵²

China currently recognizes as “lawful” (hefa 合法) religious activities that are sanctioned and controlled by the government. Any activity that is not state-sanctioned is regarded as an “illegal religious activity” and is liable to “rectification” or “suppression” by administrative or judicial measures. To be considered lawful, religious activities must fulfill all the following conditions:

belong to one of the five official religions recognized by the government (Buddhism, Taoism, Catholicism, Protestantism, and Islam);

 be carried out by officially-accredited religious personnel;

 take place in government-approved places of religious activities; and

 be within the ideological bounds fixed by the Party. 

Each of the five recognized religions must also conform its doctrine to specific requirements. For example, Catholicism must not refer to allegiance to the Vatican, while Islam must oppose “separatism” and “illegal religious activities.”

The “Law on Regional National Autonomy” likewise stipulates in article 11 that “[t]he organs of self-government of national autonomous areas shall guarantee the freedom of religious belief to citizens of the various nationalities.”⁵³ However, the “autonomy law” also imposes significant limits that invite selective, politically motivated crackdowns on believers. Article 11 prohibits the use of religion to “to engage in activities that disrupt public order, impair the health of citizens or interfere with the educational system of the state.” Beijing reserves an important power with respect to the autonomy law: the central government may overrule regulations passed in autonomous areas and restrict religious activities in the interest of national security, public order, health, or education.

[48] “Jiang Zemin, Zhu Rongji address National work conference,” Xinhua, December 12, 2001, FBIS, December 19, 2001 [CHI-20011-1212].

[49] Constitution of the People’s Republic of China, Art. 36 [中华人民共和国宪法, 第三十六条]

[50] Human Rights Watch, China: State Control of Religion (New York: Human Rights Watch, 1997).

[51] Mickey Spiegel, “Control and Containment in the Reform Era,” in Jason Kindopp and Carol Lee Hamrin, eds., God and Caesar in China (WashingtonD.C.: Brookings Institution Press, 2004), p. 41.

[52] Pitman B. Potter, “Belief in Control: Regulation of Religion in China,” The China Quarterly, Issue 174 (2003).

[53] Law of the People's Republic of China on Regional National Autonomy, 1984, amended 2001. [中华人民共和国民族区域自治法(2001修正)].

IV. A Repressive Framework: Regulation of Religion in Xinjiang

…the intensified effort to administer religious affairs according to law…should be regarded as an important radical measure to oppose ethnic splittism and preserve social and political stability.⁵⁴

At its heart, the control of religious activities in Xinjiang is a way of opposing “ethnic splittism” (minzu fenlie 民族分裂). Xinjiang’s Party Secretary Wang Lequan stressed in 1991 that the “major task” facing the authorities in Xinjiang was to“manage religion and guide it in being subordinate to … the central task of economic construction, the unification of the motherland, and the objective of national unity,” a vision of subordination that has hardly changed since.⁵⁵

Although China has increasingly faced international criticism for its religious policies in Xinjiang,⁵⁶ it has persistently rejected such criticism. In May 2003, the Information Office of the State Council released a White Paper⁵⁷ on the “History and Development of Xinjiang.”⁵⁸ The White Paper is the government’s most recent and comprehensive statement on the situation of ethnic minorities in Xinjiang. It marshals various facts and statistics to make the case that ethnic minorities are thriving in Xinjiang. These include the existence of some 24,000 religious venues in Xinjiang; the role played by ethnic minorities in the administration of religion and religious policies; the allocation of “specialized funds for the maintenance and repair of the key mosques”; the establishment of “an Islamic college specializing in training senior clergymen”; “guaranteed access to scriptures and other religious publications”; and, above all, the fact that “all religious bodies independently carry out religious activities within the scope prescribed by law.”⁵⁹

The White Paper states that, “The right to freedom of religious belief for various ethnic groups is fully respected, and all normal religious activities are protected by law,” specifically citing the enactment by the Xinjiang government of the Provisional Regulations for the Administration of Religious Activity Venues in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region––a regulation that was abruptly rescinded in May 2004⁶⁰––and “other regulations in accordance with the constitution and the law.”

However, there is a significant discrepancy between official materials published for international and public consumption and those intended for internal circulation. These secret regulations and policy statements––documents that are used as immediate guides to the implementation of laws and policies––are not publicly available and provide a much stricter framework for religious activity. Given the internal nature of most such policy instructions, most of these documents, and the detailed picture of regulation they present, have not been available until now. They are described below.

Policies Hidden from the Public

While white papers, the constitution, national legislation, and certain national and provincial policy statements are available to the public and reported in newspapers, there is a large and growing category of Chinese regulations and policies that the government and Party deliberately keep hidden.

Two specific regulations—revealed here for the first time––establish a draconian ban against unauthorized disclosure of information regarding almost any national minority or religious matter or policy, even if unrelated to national security. One regulation was jointly promulgated in 1995 by the State Secrets Protection Bureau (Guojia mimi baoshou ju 国家保密局) and the State Council Ethnic Affairs Commission. ⁶¹ The other regulation was promulgated at the same time by the State Secrets Protection Bureau and the State Administration of Religious Affairs (formerly the Religious Affairs Bureau).⁶² Salient information classified as state secrets includes:

1. government analyses of “situations and trends that seriously undermine ethnic relations as well as state unity and social instability caused by ethnic issues” must be classified as “top-secret,” as must public security measures “drafted to counter the use of religion in political infiltration and serious illegal activities” or measures taken to manage public security incidents relating to ethnic affairs and religion;

2. draft works classified as “highly confidential” including policies and analyses prepared “in response to religious situations and trends,” “important strategies, policies, and measures related to ethnic affairs work,” and “proposals and measures drafted to handle ethnic conflicts”;

3. foreign affairs matters such as “policies and measures drafted to counter major foreign affairs problems related to religious” and “measures in external propaganda work” that “need to be controlled internally.”

The regulations also list matters that must be treated as “internal” (neibu 内部), that is not to be publicized or announced without authorization. These include most documents relating to religious and ethnic policies which would routinely be public information in other countries. Among them are drafts of religious laws and regulations; reports, opinions and suggestions by religious representatives regarding religious affairs; “analyses of developments with overseas religious organizations and their personnel”; “information and statistics unsuitable for the public regarding religious organizations, institutions and activities”; and the “content of state organ meetings unsuitable for the public.”

While there is no criminal liability for disclosure of “internal” material, in practice many people in China have been sentenced for doing so because state secret laws allow authorities to classify material retrospectively. Some of the regulations and policies referred to in this report are treated as “internal” or are simply unavailable to the public.

Regulation in 1994-2001: “Keeping a handle on” the imams and party cadres

Until their revision in 2001, religious activities in Xinjiang were governed by a set of regulations issued in 1994, which echoed the national regulations.⁶³ In the intervening years, a series of Communist Party directives indicated that Xinjiang would be targeted for special, effectively discriminatory treatment. For example, in 1996, Document Number 7 from the Political Bureau of the Central Committee, while still operating within the framework of the 1994 Regulations, laid the outline for a considerable toughening of regulations concerning religion and for the curbing of religious freedom that continues to this day.⁶⁴

In October 1998, less than two months after an inspection tour of Xinjiang by President Jiang Zemin, local authorities created a new and comprehensive set of instructions on control of religion. These were based on directives originating from the central government.⁶⁵ The “October 1998 Instructions” called for a tightening of regulations governing the management of religious personnel, religious places, the content of religious teachings, and the “fight” against all non-governmental religious activities. In violation of the guarantee of religious freedom enshrined in the Chinese constitution, the document explicitly instructed local authorities to establish “a political verification dossier to make sure imams meet political requirements,” the aim being no less than keeping “a handle on the imam's ideological state at all times.”⁶⁶

The instructions also established a system of annual revision of the accreditations given to imams. This required imams to attend “patriotic education” courses and seminars, and to demonstrate their ideological conformity. Religious leaders were required to “stand on the side of government firmly and express their viewpoints unambiguously.” Any who failed to meet these requirements would be “stripped of imam status.”⁶⁷

In 2000, the “Interim Provisions on Disciplinary Punishments for Party Members and Organs that Violate Political Discipline in Fighting Separatism and Safeguarding Unity” [the “2000 Interim Provisions”] provided a wide range of sanctions against Party members involved in religious activities. The provisions include strict rules for religious practice by Communist Party members in Xinjiang, and in effect the freedom of religious belief. Although the issue was openly debated in the Chinese press during the 1990s, the CCP has always demanded that its members be atheists. Thus, the enactment of special regulations specifically to enforce this in Xinjiang can be seen as part of an effort to “step up the struggle against national separatism” and to “root out reactionary religious behaviors.”⁶⁸

The 2000 Interim Provisions state that sanctions must be taken against “persons in the Party who have a strong religious belief and are keen on organizing and participating in religious activities.” Furthermore, such persons are held responsible if they “connive at and harbor a situation wherein Party members, Party and government functionaries … teachers and students … are engaged in religious activities that will interrupt the order of their work … such as religious services, scriptural studies, and Ramadan.”⁶⁹ Restrictions also apply in the field of publication, for people who “participate in the printing, reproduction, compilation, publication, and issuance of propaganda materials on religious subjects in violation of relevant stipulations … that impair the unification of the motherland and national unity.”⁷⁰ The control extends well into the private life of Party members, who are forbidden to “establish contacts with overseas religious organizations,” “go on an overseas pilgrimage without authorization,” or even “send their children and families to private schools and private classes for scripture studies.”⁷¹  

The 2001 draft amendments to the 1994 Regulations: narrowing the scope of “normal” religious activities

The 2000 Interim Provisions were only the first sign of more stringent regulations to come. In July 2001, a series of comprehensive amendments to the 1994 Regulations was adopted by the Chairmen’s Committee of the Xinjiang People’s Regional Congress⁷² and submitted for deliberation to the Standing Committee (hereafter the “2001 Amendments”).⁷³ These amendments represented a new regulatory regime extraordinarily hostile to religious activity in Xinjiang.⁷⁴

The 2001 Amendments, yet to be made public, introduced considerable restrictions beyond those in the 1994 Regulations. They were appended to compilations of religious regulations circulated solely to local religious affairs bureaus for their internal use. From an analysis of references in other official documents, however, one can deduce that the amended regulations have superseded provisions in effect prior to their promulgation and that they govern religious activities in Xinjiang today.

The 2001 Amendments severely tighten the already restrictive provisions of the 1994 Regulations on Religious Activities in five main areas. These are:

a) narrowing the scope of “normal religious activities;

b) the extension of the “anti-separatist” clause, previously applied only to the clergy, to all “citizens who profess a religion;

c) increased control over registration and operations of religious organizations;

d) tightened control over religious publications; and

e) heavier sanctions and penalties.

a) Narrowing the protection of “normal religious activities”

One of the most critical features of the 2001 Amendments on religious activities in Xinjiang was deletion of the phrase “protection of normal religious activities” from the stated purposes of the regulations in the opening article. The 1994 Regulations specifically stated that one of their purposes was the “protection of normal religious activities” (weihua zhengchang de zongjiao huodong维护正常的宗教活动). The revision in the amended article states that the purpose of the Amendments is to “regulate religious activities according to law, strengthen the management of religious affairs, and guide religion to adapt to socialist society.” The change suggests that the focus of the amended regulations is to further limit the scope of acceptable religious activities.

It is difficult to overstate the importance of this change. The guarantee of “normal religious activities” has been at the heart of the religious policy of the CCP at the national level since 1982 and is guaranteed by the constitution (article 36). Even though the authorities have always been the only judge of what is “normal” and what is “illegal,” the deletion of a legally acknowledged entitlement to “normal religious activities” as the stated purpose of the regulation further restricts the ability of religious practitioners to negotiate categories of action that should be presumed to be lawful.

 

The 2001 Amendments implicitly condition the enjoyment of rights on the respect of obligations. A comparison of the 2001 Amendments with the 1994 Regulations demonstrates the heightened emphasis on the control, as opposed to the protection, of religious activity. For example, in article 1 of the 2001 Amendments the purpose of “protecting normal religious activities” has been deleted and replaced by “regulating” such activities “according to law” and “guiding” religion to “adapt to socialist society.” Article 1 now reads:

These regulations are formulated to protect the citizens’ freedom of religious belief, [protect normal] regulate religious activities according to law,[and] strengthen the management of religious affairs, and guide religion in such a way that it adapts to socialist society. The regulations are drawn up in accordance with the constitution, the relevant laws and statutes, and in the light of the actual conditions prevailing in the autonomous region. (italics and square brackets indicate 2001 insertions and deletions from the 1994 text respectively).

Article 26, dealing with the registration and operation of religious organizations, was similarly amended: the guarantee that religious organizations can conduct “normal religious activities” was removed and replaced by the more specific limitation that they can “organize religious activities and perform religious functions according to law.”

The only explicit protections for religious activities offered by the 2001 Regulations can be found in the new articles detailing the “rights and obligations” of religious personnel and religious organizations. Article 12 states that:

Clergy enjoy the following rights and privileges. They may:

(1) engage in religious and church (mosque) activities according to law;

(2) participate in the management of the place for religious activities where he or she belongs;

(3) receive religious education; engage in religious academic research and exchange.

The corresponding duties appear in the next article:

Clergy shoulder the following responsibilities. They must:

(1) love the country and the faith, abide by the laws and statutes of the state;

(2) accept the supervision of the religious affairs bureaus of the people's government, the religious organization(s), and the democratic management organization of the places for religious activities;

(3) protect buildings, cultural objects, facilities and the environment of the places for religious activities.

Religious organizations are subject to a similar bifurcation of their rights and obligations. Article 27 of the 2001 Regulations states that “Religious organizations enjoy the following rights:

(1) the protection of the rights and interests of citizen believers, the clergy, and the places for religious activities; and the guidance and supervision of the operation of the places for religious activities;

(2) the confirmation and supervision of their clergy and other personnel;

(3) the enjoyment of the ownership and the right to use their buildings and other property according to law; and to independently dispose of their income;

(4) the management of economic entities for the purpose of self-support.

Along with these “rights,” article 28 states that religious organizations must “perform the following duties:

 

(1) abide by the laws and statutes of the state, accept control and supervision by the religious affairs bureaus and other relevant departments of people's governments at various levels;

(2) propagate and carry out the policy of freedom of religious belief;

(3) reflect the aspirations and demands of the citizen believers;

(4) educate citizen believers in patriotism, abiding by the law, and living in                     harmony;

(5) engage in training activities to enhance the capabilities of the clergy;

(6) assist the religious affairs bureaus of people's governments in successfully managing religious affairs;

(7) guide citizen believers to participate in building socialist modernization.”

In determining whether clergy are qualified to enjoy their delineated “rights and privileges,” the authorities clearly are granted ample grounds to assess subjectively whether the required duties are fulfilled. For example, whether an imam “reflects the aspirations and demands of the citizen believers” or “guides citizen believers to participate in building socialist modernization” is not susceptible to a uniform, predictable, or objective interpretation. These are political terms, the meaning of which has frequently changed in recent years. The new formulation has removed any grounds for a clergy member or a citizen charged with “illegal religious activities” to argue in his or her defense that the actions for which he or she was accused were in fact “normal religious activities,” as protected by previous legislation.

b) Extension of the “anti-separatist” clause, previously applied only to the clergy, to all “citizens who profess a religion”

One of the intrusive demands on Muslim clerics set forth in Article 8 of the 1994 Regulations was the obligation to demonstrate loyalty to the Chinese state. The 2001 Amendments take this requirement and extend it to “all citizens who profess a religion.”⁷⁵ These requirements make religious freedom conditional on support for the government and Party leaders.

The requirement that believers “oppose” whatever is seen as “national splittism and illegal religious activities” is undefined in the regulations. Assessments are to be made by the authorities on the basis of Party instructions, which vary from time to time and are necessarily interpreted in practice in highly subjective ways by local officials. It is a catch-all clause that hands virtually unlimited power to the authorities to investigate or arrest any religious practitioner in disfavor with officials, a phenomenon that appears to be reflected by the high number of political sentences handed down in Xinjiang courts, particularly for certain groups of defendants (see section VI below).

c) Increased control over the registration and operation of religious organizations

Article 26 of the 2001 Amendments specifies that organizations can only begin activities after being approved, thus prohibiting activities while registration is pending.⁷⁶ The registration and operation of religious organizations require approval by both a Religious Affairs Bureau and a Civil Affairs Bureau above the county level.⁷⁷

The 2001 Amendments also narrows the right of registered religious organizations to sponsor seminaries, schools, or scripture classes. The requirement in the 1994 Regulations that these activities have prior approval has been retained, but the 2001 Regulations now emphasize that no one at all may teach “scripture students” without prior approval.⁷⁸

The prohibition on teaching without prior approval appears to apply to individuals as well as institutions and professionals. It thus establishes an unusually onerous restriction on the free exercise of religion, not otherwise known to exist in contemporary China. Traditionally, in the countryside, parents would arrange for their children to receive some religious education, along with story-telling and folk songs, from someone knowledgeable or from a community elder, especially around the time of festivals or ceremonies such as weddings. Increasingly, however, the authorities have prohibited these kinds of semi-public meetings from touching on religious issues, on the pretext that they constitute “illegal religious activities.”⁷⁹

Although these prohibitions do not seem to apply to a parent teaching a child, parents told Human Rights Watch they feared instructing their own children because they worried that their children might inadvertently display signs of religious awareness and attract the suspicion of authorities. Uighur government employees also consider themselves at risk if they instruct their children or other relatives in religion.

 

Even more restrictive is the prohibition on religious activities that “span different localities.” This outlaws religious personnel from conducting activities in places other than where they are registered. It also covers mass activities that span different localities.⁸⁰ 

The amended regulations also strictly prohibit pilgrimages (chaojin yundong 朝觐运动) not organized by the government.⁸¹ Authorities can use these provisions to control activities well beyond proselytism or missionary work. The so-called “on-the-spot” principle prevents, for instance, an imam from Hetian from preaching in Urumqi, or a Kashgar mosque from conducting a ceremony that convenes believers from different parts of Xinjiang. Authorities can also use this provision more broadly to prevent believers from establishing links with religious establishments in other geographical areas and from even visiting mosques or religious places in different areas of Xinjiang or China without permission.

The supervision of places of religious activities also constitutes a new feature of the 2001 Amendments. Under article 16, religious organizations are now required to “accept control and supervision by the religious affairs bureaus and other relevant departments of the people’s governments at various levels,” as well as to “assist the religious affairs bureaus of people's governments in successfully managing religious affairs.” 

The clergy is similarly required to “accept” supervision and routine checks. These regulations stipulate that those who violate the law or are “found incompetent” should be dismissed and the matter put on record at the county level Religious Affairs Bureau (art. 14).⁸² Political loyalty to the state and Party is an essential element establishing the “competence” of religious personnel, although interpretations of this undefined term vary widely. For instance, at the Xinjiang Conference on Religious Work, which took place in October 2002 in Urumqi, Xinjiang Party Secretary Wang Lequan instructed the authorities to “be sure that [religious public figures] are politically qualified.” By making political loyalty a pre-condition of the compulsory official approval of religious personnel––credentials that have to be regularly renewed––the authorities ensure that only pro-government figures can engage in religious activity and that any clerics who step out of narrow ideological strictures will be sanctioned or expelled.

d) Tightened control over religious publications

The fourth significant control mechanism introduced in the 2001 Amendments concerns the dissemination of religious publications. The amendments mandate prior governmental approval for the sale and distribution of religious material, including the distribution of leaflets.⁸³ 

The Amendments also introduce criteria that will make it more difficult to secure such approval. These criteria ban any publication by religious groups operating at a level below the provincial level; only the very largest institutions in Xinjiang are registered at that level, and these are few in number. Article 25 of the 1994 Regulations stipulated that “religious organizations wishing to publish … should complete the formalities for permission in accordance with the relevant stipulations.” The amended article now reads: “Religious organizations of the Autonomous Region’s level … should complete the formalities…” No provision is made for religious organizations below the provincial level.

 

In effect this means that approval for the publication of such documents has now been shifted from the local to the provincial level, presumably entailing delay and a higher level of scrutiny. As a result, publication activity outside of Urumqi has dwindled as publishing venues active in producing Uighur literature in the 1980s, such as the Kashgar People’s Publishing House, cease to produce any material that might run afoul of this regulation. 

The scope of the type of publications that must be regulated in this way has also been expanded. Article 31 states that:

Those religious organizations in the autonomous region wishing to publish, reprint or issue scriptures, classics or publish interpretations of classics, religious doctrines, or cannons should complete the formalities for permission in accordance with the relevant stipulations of the state and the autonomous region. No organization or individual may publish, print, reprint or issue religious publications without permission.

As before, individuals and non-religious organizations do not have the right to publish religious material outside of the government-approved system. The regulations also articulate the ban on bringing into China from abroad religious publications deemed to endanger state security or the public interest.⁸⁴

e) Heavier sanctions and penalties

The 2001 Amendments also introduce a range of administrative sanctions and penalties for religious sites or organizations that violate the regulations. They permit fines to be levied for violations, ranging from 200 to 2,000 yuan (approximately U.S. $25-$250). The average income in Xinjiang is about 1,800 yuan a year. The previous regulations did not stipulate any fines.  

Other forms of punishment range from “criticism and education” to “cancellation of registration.” More alarming, the new amendments specify that certain “grave” violations may now constitute the crime of “endangering state security.” Whereas the 1994 Regulations provided only for offenses to be dealt with “according to the PRC management of public order dispositions” or generally according to criminal law.⁸⁵

The regulations leave it to the Xinjiang Religious Affairs Bureau to ascertain whether the violation is “minor” or “serious” and if it warrants a fine or an administrative punishment.

The comprehensive nature of the 2001 Amendments, which impose political control over every aspect of religious activity, creates a legal net that can catch virtually anyone the authorities wish to target—a useful tool against Uighur ethno-national aspirations. In addition to providing new grounds for prosecuting offenders, the 2001 Amendments systematize collective responsibility in cases of violations and allow the administrative and security authorities to carry out even broader repression of dissent by considering all forms of religion to be potentially disguised forms of separatism. Their repressive character is best interpreted as an alignment of the regulatory framework with actual practices, particularly as experienced by the Uighur population.  

A Manual for Urumqi Municipality Ethnic Religious Work

The repressive framework imposed by the 2001 Amendments most probably derives from practical experience, and incorporates provisions already codified in the guidelines of religious affairs bureaus at various levels of government and of CCP religious affairs committees that supervise their work. These organs have the power to register, inspect and supervise religious organizations and sites, accredit clerics and approve religious publications. They effectively serve as an administrative arbiter of legitimate religious activities, relegating to illegality all the activities they do not endorse.

This section provides a previously undisclosed look at how these restrictive principles are put into practice in Xinjiang’s capital, Urumqi. The extracts presented below are excerpted from a 2000 handbook entitled A Manual for Urumqi Municipality Ethnic Religious Work, edited by the Ethnic Religious Work Committee of the Urumqi Nationalities Religious Affairs Bureau Work Committee (Manual). The Manual is “to be used to conduct education and serve cadres for nationalities religious affairs in their work.”⁸⁶ 

The Manual is probably the most comprehensive and detailed account of actual religious policies in Xinjiang to surface outside of China. It is also indisputably authoritative, as it was published by the institution in charge of controlling religion in the regional capital.

The Manual is structured as responses to 146 different questions, ranging from Party doctrinal topics (“What are the four fundamental principles and guiding principles on religious work set forth by Comrade Jiang Zemin?”) to specific issues that religious affairs cadres have to deal with (“What qualifications must religious personnel possess?”), and government policies (“What measures has the Urumqi Municipality Committee taken in the recent years to protect social stability?”).

The close correspondence between the Manual’s guidelines and the 2001 revised amendments tends to support the conclusion that the latter were designed to integrate and rationalize stipulations that were developed by the religious affairs bureaus. The Manual gives a rare glimpse into the actual policies of the religious affairs bureaus in Xinjiang, in particular in regards to the definition of illegal religious activities, the inspection of places of religious activities, and the censorship of religious publications.

a) What are illegal religious activities? What are their main forms?

Question No. 87 in the Manual is answered by a list of sixteen forms of illegal activity:

“In the category of illegal religious activity is any religious activity that violates the country’s constitution, laws and regulations or the Autonomous Region’s management of religious affairs’ regulations, dispositions or rules.

The main forms of illegality are:

1) compelling people to believe;

2) compelling people to participate in religious activities;

3) privately organizing religious study schools;

4) using religion to meddle (ganyu 干预) in administration, justice and education, weddings, family planning or cultural activities (wenhua yule huodong 文化娱乐活动);

5) without having obtained authorization, engaging in religious activities spanning different localities or organizing other religious activities;

6) beautifying, revamping or enlarging places for religious activities without having obtained authorization;

7) restoring abolished religious feudal privileges and oppressive exploitative systems;

8) printing religious propaganda material without authorization;

9) receiving foreign contributions from religious organizations and individuals without authorization;

10) going abroad to study religion or carrying out religious activities in conjunction with foreign religious organizations without authorization;

11) privately setting up a religious “spot” and conducting proselytism without registration and authorization;

12) slandering the authorities, plotting to murder patriotic religious figures, fighting against the leading authorities of religious places and organizations, premeditatedly evading supervision, and stirring up trouble;

13) engaging in religious infiltration, setting up religious organizations, conducting proselytism and so on, by hostile enemy forces;

14) advocating “holy war,” inciting religious fanaticism, developing religious extremist forces, spreading rumors, distorting history, advocating separatism, opposing the Party and the socialist system, sabotaging social stability or the unity of nationalities, inciting the masses to illegally rally and demonstrate, attacking the organs of the Party, government, army or public security;

15) using religion to breed separatist elements and reactionary backbone elements or to establish reactionary organizations; to carry out other activities that are harmful to the good order of society, production and life, and to criminal activities;

16) spreading evil cults.”⁸⁷

Beyond painting a very dark picture of repression of religion, the list is notable in several respects. It is more extensive than even the already-extensive list set out in either the 1994 Regulations or the 2001 Amendments, particularly in two main areas: the supervision of places of worship, and the publication of any material related to religion or “sensitive” questions. 

In addition, many of the prohibitions represent blatant and substantial curtailment of basic civil and political rights beyond those relating to the right to freedom of religious belief. For example, “inciting the masses to illegally rally and demonstrate” implicates freedom of assembly; “distorting history” or “using religion to meddle in ... cultural activities” violates free expression; the injunction on “going abroad to study religion” or engaging in religious activities that “span different localities” tramples on freedom of movement. The list also contains catch-all “offenses” that allow the authorities to deny religious freedom under virtually any pretext, as for example using religion “to carry out other activities that are harmful to the good order of society,” or “to breed separatist elements and reactionary backbone elements.”

b) Inspection of mosques and collective responsibility

The Manual provides useful insights into how mosques are actually monitored and inspected. A “democratic management team” (minzhu guanli zuzhi 民主管理组织), composed of clerics and religious personnel vetted by the Religious Affairs Bureau, is responsible for each mosque, as described below:

The teams are in charge of daily management, establishing a completed system of regulations, and … maintaining the “annual inspection handbook” (nianjian tongzhi shu 年鉴通知书) which is a “self-supervision, self-inspection” instrument…The management teams must respect the laws and regulations, carry out religious activities and not engage in external religious illegal activities, have their finances in order, [have their] registration in order, [have] democratic management, and must permit annual inspection within the limits fixed by regulations.⁸⁸

Annual inspections are conducted by the Religious Affairs Bureau according to national “[m]easures regarding the Annual Inspection of Places of Religious Activities,” adopted in 1996.⁸⁹ After inspection, each religious site is given a certificate that it is either “conforming” (hege 合格), or “non-conforming” (bu hege 不合格).

The Manualindicates that management teams are to be held accountable in case of non-conformity and can be “investigated” and referred to higher authorities:

If the case is not serious, the authorities can issue a warning, stop the activities or withdraw the registration. For especially grave violations, the case must be transmitted to the people’s government of the same level to be suppressed according to law.⁹⁰

These provisions, with their characteristic vagueness, bestow a significant degree of discretion on the authorities in deciding whether to certify mosques or on what basis to impose sanctions.

c) Censorship of publications “touching upon Islamic religion”

The Manual reveals for the first time the details of a draconian system of censorship of religious publications.⁹¹ Not only does publication require approval from the Xinjiang Religious Affairs Bureau and the Xinjiang News Publishing Department, but all publications also undergo multiple rounds of censorship, including at the printing and distribution stage. The content must be in line with precise guidelines, and cadres are instructed to defer to the higher authorities for any publication involving “sensitive questions,” such as “the implementation of religious policies” or issues related to “national minorities’ religious beliefs, taboos and customs.”⁹²

These highly restrictive stipulations, which explicitly forbid “non-religious group(s)” and individuals from “publishing religious material,” are mirrored by strict censorship on the content of publications:

Any item to be published (including news and articles) related to research and appraisal of Islamic religion must uphold the Marxist point of view of religion, and use the yardstick of the Party's and the government's religious policies and regulations

The explicit mention of the existence of a category of “sensitive questions” which must be reported “to the higher level” demonstrates that management of religion and nationalities affairs in Xinjiang is a matter of top-level political concern. One of the allegedly “sensitive question(s)” on which extra censorship is required is “the implementation of religious policies.”

The Manual then turns to the publishing and distribution system, specifically singling-out “publications related to Islamic religion”:

Commercial presses that do not have a “publishing unit” state license should never, without exception, accept commissions for any kind of publication related to Islamic religion…Distribution units should not distribute books, magazines, journals and musical material of religious nature from non-official publishing units.⁹⁴

Finally, the Manualprescribes sanctions for publishing units that produce content “violating the Party's policies of nationalities and religion” and which “have created in society a severe and negative influence.” These range from administrative penalties of “suspension and rectification” (tingye zhengdun 停业整顿) to confiscation of the printing license,” as well as judicial penalties.⁹⁵

Rather than drawing a clear line between legal and illegal publications, the Manualdescribes a system that institutionalizes the almost absolute discretion of the authorities to decide what to allow and what to censor. The sheer number of permits necessary to carry out any type of activity related to religious practice—most of them based on political criteria—give authorities wide discretion to crack down on clerics, activities, and publications that do not unconditionally endorse Party views. 

[54] Editorial, Xinjiang Daily [新疆日报], October 13, 2002, FBIS, November 5, 2002 [CHI-2002-1029].

[55] “Xinjiang Party Secretary Economic Development, Separatism,” Outlook [僚望], June 25, 2001, no. 26, pp. 52-53, FBIS, July 25, 2001 [CHI-2001-0710]. Wang Lequan reiterated these views in October 2002 while presiding over a regional party and government conference on religious work, to wit: “Our proposal of letting religions and the socialist society adapt to each other (…) ask religious personnel (…) to subordinate themselves to and serve the highest state interests and overall national interest in the religious activities they undertake (…) oppose all illegal activities that use religion to harm the socialist motherland and the people’s interests.” Editorial, Xinjiang Daily [新疆日报], October 13, 2002, FBIS, November 5, 2002 [CHI-2002-1029].

[56] The former United Nation High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mary Robinson, raised concerns on Xinjiang on her two visits to China, in November 2001 and August 2002. (“Robinson warns China on repression,” BBC News Online, November 8, 200; “U.N. slams China 'anti-terror' crackdown,” CNN.com, August 20, 2002).

The European Parliament called in 2003 and 2004 for the adoption of a resolution on China at the U.N. Commission on Human Rights, citing the situation in Xinjiang (European Parliament, “European Parliament resolution on the EU's rights, priorities and recommendations for the 59th Session of the U.N. Commission on Human Rights,” January 30, 2003; European Parliament, “European Parliament resolution on the EU's rights, priorities and recommendations for the 60th Session of the U.N. Commission on Human Rights in Geneva,” January 19, 2004).

The United States Congressional-Executive Commission on China has noted “harsh repression and restrictions on religious activity” in Xinjiang in its 2003 annual report to the Congress. (Congressional-Executive Commission on China, Annual Report 2003, October 2, 2003). Similar concerns are found in its previous report (Congressional-Executive Commission on China, Annual Report 2002, October 2, 2002).

Human Rights Watch, Human Rights in China, and Amnesty International have published a number of reports on the situation in Xinjiang. See “U.S.: Don’t Send Detainees Back to China,” Human Rights Watch, November 26, 2003, [online] http://www.hrw.org/press/2003/11/us112603.htm; Human Rights Watch, “China: Human Rights Concerns in Xinjiang,” October 2001, [online], http://www.hrw.org/backgrounder/asia/china-bck1017.htm; Human Rights Watch, “China: State Control of Religion: Update #1,” March 1998; Human Rights in China, “Criminalizing Ethnicity: Political Repression in Xinjiang,” China Rights Forum, January 2004; Amnesty International, “People’s Republic of China: Uighurs fleeing persecution as China wages its ‘war on terror’,” July 7, 2004 [AI Index: ASA 17/021/2004]; Amnesty International, “China: International community must oppose attempt to brand peaceful political activists as ‘terrorists’,” December 19, 2003 [AI Index: ASA 17/040/2003]; Amnesty International, “People’s Republic of China: No justice for the victims of the 1997 crackdown in Ghulja (Yining),” February 4, 2003 [AI Index: ASA 17/011/2003]; Amnesty International, “People’s Republic of China: China’s anti-terrorism legislation and repression in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region,” March 2002 [AI Index: ASA 17/10/2002].

[57] The “White Papers” of the Chinese government summarize the official view of human rights and explicitly aim to refute foreign criticism. The first paper was published two years after the 1989 Tiananmen massacre, in November 1991, soon followed by other white papers on specific issues, such as religious freedom, ethnic minorities, Tibet, and so on. As reputed scholars have pointed out, “One explicit aim of the White Paper was to refute foreign criticism and present an alternative and more rosy picture of the situation in China.” Steven C. Angle and Marina Svensson, The Chinese Human Rights Reader: Documents and Commentary, 1900-2000, (London and Armonk: M.E. Sharpe, 1991), p.356.

[58] Information Office of the State Council Of the People's Republic of China, White Paper: History and Development of Xinjiang, May, 2003, Beijing, [online] http://www.china.org.cn/e-white/20030526/ [中华人民共和国 国务院新闻办公室: 新疆的历史与发展 (白皮书) , 2003年5月, [online] http://news.xinhuanet.com/zhengfu/2003-06/12/content_916235.htm].

[59] White Paper, Section VIII “Upholding Equality and Unity Among Ethnic Groups, and Freedom of Religious Belief.”

[60] The “Provisional Regulations for the Administration of Religious Activity Venues in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region” [新疆维吾尔自治区宗教活动场所管理暂行规定] were repealed in May 2004. It is unclear whether newer regulations were adopted to replace them. (“The government of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region repeals 10 governmental regulations in administrative clean-up,” Xinjiang Economic Daily, May 24, 2004 [“新疆维吾尔自治区清理行政审批废止１０项政府规章,” 新疆经济报, 2004年5月24日]).

[61] “Regulations on State Secrets and Specific Classification Limits in Religious Affairs Work,” Promulgated by the State Administration of Religious Affairs and the State Secrets Protection Bureau, October 12, 1995 [国务院宗教事务局，国家保密局：宗教工作中国家秘密及其密级具体范围的规定, 1995年10月12日].

[62] “Regulations on the Specific Scope of State Secrets and Classification of Ethnic Work,” Promulgated by the State Ethnic Affairs Commission and the State Secrets Protection Bureau, March 17, 1995.

[63] Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region People’s Congress, “Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region Regulations on Religious Affairs,” July 16, 1994, effective October 10, 1994. [新疆维吾尔自治区人大常委会：新疆维吾尔自治区宗教事务管理条例。发布日期：1994年7月16日, 实施日期：1994年10月1日]. On national regulations see Human Rights Watch, China: State Control of Religion.

[64] Document No. 7 urged authorities to “[l]egally strengthen the leadership and control over religion,” “[t]ake strong measures to prevent and fight against the infiltration and sabotaging activities of foreign religious forces,” “[r]estrict all illegal religious activities,” and “[s]everely control the building of new mosques.” “Record of the Meeting of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the Chinese Communist Party concerning the maintenance of Stability in Xinjiang (Document 7),” reproduced in Human Rights Watch, “China: State Control of Religion: Update #1.”

[65] "Unequivocally Oppose National Separatism, Illegal Religious Activities,” Xinjiang Daily [新疆日报], August 16, 1998, in "Xinjiang Official on Opposing Separatism," FBIS, October 18, 1998 [CHI-98-291].

[66] Ibid.

[67] Ibid.

[68] “Interim Provisions on Disciplinary Punishments for Party Members and Organs that Violate Political Discipline in Fighting Separatism and Safeguarding Unity,” Discipline Inspection Commission of the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Regional CPC Committee, December 14, 2000. The Interim Regulations were published in the Xinjiang Daily [新疆日报], May 8, 2001 in “Xinjiang Regulations on Party Discipline in Anti-Separatism Efforts,” FBIS, September 17, 2001 [CHI-2001-0529].

[69] Ibid.

[70] Ibid.

[71] Ibid. See also Convention on the Rights of the Child, art. 14(2), which protects the rights of parents “to provide direction to the child.”

[72] This ad hoc Committee comprised the Chairmen of the nationalities, religious, foreign affairs and overseas Chinese Committees of the Standing Committee of the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region Congress.

[73] “Draft Amendments to the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region Regulations on the Management of Religious Affairs Adopted by the 23rd Session of the Standing Committee of the 9th People's Congress of Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region,” submitted on July 16, 2001 [新疆维吾尔自治区人民代表大会常务委员会第九届人民代表大会常务委员会爹日但侧会议通过：新疆维吾尔自治区宗教事务管理条例修正案 （草案）， 2001年7月16日].

[74] The 2001 Amendments represent a codification of practice in Xinjiang’s religious affairs bureaus and committees. When submitting the 2001 Amendments for ratification in July 2001, the Conference of Chairmen reported it had conducted investigations and studies for nearly six months, and “extensively solicited opinions, held seven discussion meetings with the relevant departments, retired leading cadres, experts and scholars, religious groups and well-known patriotic religious personages …members of the Standing Committee,” as well as hearing “the opinions and suggestions of nineteen relevant units.”

[75] "Citizens who profess a religion must support the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party and the socialist system, love their country and abide by its laws, safeguard the unification of the motherland and national solidarity, and oppose national splittism and illegal religious activities." (art. 9).

[76] “Religious organizations are mass organizations representing the legal rights and interests of the clergy and citizen religious believers. A religious organization must be examined and approved by the religious affairs department of a people's government above the county level. It must then be approved by and registered with the Civil Affairs department at the same level. Only then can it begin its activities. Those religious organizations that are qualified may obtain the status of legal persons.” (art. 26).

[77] The precise registration procedure is detailed in: National Bureau of Religious Affairs, “Measures regarding the registration of places of religious activities,” April 13, 1994 [国务院宗教事务局: 宗教活动场所登记办法, 1994年4月13日].The regulation specify that registration can be downgraded to a one or two year “temporary registration” if problems are found, or suspended for “rectification (zhengdun [整顿]).”

[78] “Religious seminaries and schools and scripture classes approved by the people's government should strengthen the training of patriotic religious personnel. No organization or individual may operate religious seminaries, schools or scripture classes without approval. Clergy may, in accordance with the relevant provisions of the autonomous region and with approval (by the relevant authority), teach scripture students, and train young patriotic clergy. No organization or individual may secretly teach scripture students without approval." (art. 11).

[79] Xinjiang Party Secretary Wang Lequan himself warned against the use of “folk cultural activities” [民间文化活动] as a carrier to entice part of the masses to receive reactionary propaganda to enter in opposition,” which he likened to “forms of infiltration and sabotage efforts carried out in the ideological sphere by the ethnic separatist forces.” (Xinjiang Information Network), February 1, 2002, [新疆新闻网, 2002年02月1日].

[80] “Religious activities must be carried out according to on-the-spot principle. No organized mass religious activity that spans different localities is allowed. Clergy are not allowed to administer religious activities in different localities. Missionary work in any form by non-clergy personnel is prohibited.” (art. 16).

[81] "Pilgrimage activities are to be organized by the religious affairs departments of the people's governments and religious organizations. No other organization or individual may organize such activities.” (art. 17).

[82] "During their tenure, the clergy should accept the routine check by the religious organization. Those who are found to be incompetent to carry out their duty or who have violated the law should be removed from their positions by the religious organizations, which had originally examined and approved their credentials. The matter should be reported to the religious affairs department of the county-level people's government and put on record." (art. 14).

[83] "No organization or individual is allowed to sell illegal religious publications or illegally imported religious publications. It is prohibited to distribute anywhere religious leaflets or religious publications that have not been approved by the relevant department of the people's government." (art. 24).

[84] The 1994 Regulations stipulated: “Bringing in religious publications or other religious objects from abroad is regulated by the relevant rules of the state and the autonomous region.” (art. 25) The 2001 Amendments add the following provisions: "Religious publications containing substance that endangers state security of the People's Republic of China or public interest of society may not be brought into the country. Religious publications or other religious objects illegally carried into the country from abroad discovered by public security, frontier defense or customs must be documented and handed over to the religious affairs department of the local people's government for investigation and disposal." (art. 32). The importing of such religious material was already an offense under the 1994 national regulations on religion.

[85] “Those who use religion to engage in activities that endanger national security should be punished by the national security or public security organs according to law. Those who engage in activities that constitute a crime will be called to criminal account by a judicial organ according to law.” (art. 35).

[86] Urumqi Municipality Ethnic Religious Affairs Committee, “A Manual for Urumqi Municipality Ethnic Religious Work,” June 2001. [乌鲁木齐市民族宗教事务委员会: 乌鲁木齐市民族宗教工作-普法读本， 乌鲁木齐， 2000年6月]. Quote taken from the afterword, p. 73.

[87] Manual, pp. 37-38.

[88] Manual, p. 28.

[89] The procedure for inspecting places of religious activities are set by the National Bureau of Religious Affairs, “Measures regarding the Annual Inspection of Places of Religious Activities” [国家宗教事务局:宗教活动场所年度检察办法], July 29, 1996.

[90] Manual, p. 29.

[91] “What are the national regulations on publishing material affecting Islamic religion? [Question 79] The State has concrete regulations regarding the publication of material affecting Islamic religion. It is necessary to obtain the examination and approval of the religious affairs bureau at the provincial level of the people’s government, and to report to the corresponding governmental level of the News Publishing Department. This kind of material can only be distributed and circulated within government-approved mosques. If the volume is high, examination and authorization by the national Religious Affairs Bureau and a permit from the News Publishing Department are required. Non-religious groups and individuals, without exception, are not authorized to print and publish. Those who violate the above regulations are to be dealt with according to illegal publishing activities.” Manual, pp. 33-34.

[92] Manual, pp. 33-34.

[94] Ibid.

[95] Ibid.

V. Implementation: Restrictions on Freedom of Religion in Practice

This section surveys three critical areas where the implementation of Xinjiang’s religious regulations and policies violate the basic political and religious rights of believers: the registration of religious organizations, the training or “reeducation” of religious personnel, and the ban on the construction of new mosques.

Registration of religious organizations: a no-win situation

The requirement that any type of religious organization be registered is one of the most effective means by which the authorities restrict most forms of religious activity.

By law, any association of believers has to register with the authorities, even if their activities are not strictly or exclusively religious, as in the case of traditional community gatherings or charitable groups. The registration and operation of religious organizations require approval by both the religious affairs bureaus and the civil affairs bureaus above the county level.⁹⁶

 

Any religious body may apply to register. However, Xinjiang authorities routinely deny registration to independent religious bodies on the grounds that no religious activity is allowed without state control. This opens the door for individual believers to be persecuted on the grounds that they belong to or participate in an illegal religious organization.

Most Uighurs interviewed for this report said that they would not dare to try to register a non-profit organization because they were certain that their application would be rejected and that the attempt would put them under suspicion with the authorities. Asked whether they would try to register an organization, a small group of college students in Kashgar gave this response:

No way! This is impossible! The government would immediately accuse you of being a separatist, of encouraging illegal religious activities. This is too dangerous. You can bring a lot of problems on your head if you do that. They can expel you from school. The cadre in your native village will go and ask your parents why you are “making trouble” (naoshi 闹事), that sort of thing.⁹⁷

Independent religious practitioners are thus in a no-win situation. If they ask to register they are denied registration but draw attention to themselves; if they congregate without having registered they can be charged with participating in or forming an “illegal organization.”

This is not merely a theoretical dilemma, judging by the high number of people detained in Xinjiang for political or religious offences. Many are detained in Xinjiang’s reeducation through labor camps for belonging to an “illegal organization.” An article co-signed by the vice-director of the Xinjiang Reeducation through Labor Bureau reveals that as of 2001 almost half of the detainees serving time for separatism and religion-linked offenses were detained on charges of“[belonging to] illegal organizations and [engaging in] illegal religious activities.”⁹⁸

In August 1999, for example, a group of eighteen young adult Uighurs were sentenced by a Xinjiang court for alleged separatist activities. The charges included: “inciting [others] to split China, organizing meetings, taking oaths, accepting membership, and possessing illegal publications and counterrevolutionary videos for propaganda purposes,” according to the Chinese-language newspaper Wen Wei Po [文汇报], based in Hong Kong.⁹⁹ There is no mention in the report of any evidence that the defendants had engaged in violent acts. Shirmehemet Abdurishit, the alleged leader of the group, was sentenced to a fifteen-year jail term, while the other seventeen defendants, whose names were never released, were sentenced to jail terms of up to fourteen years.¹⁰⁰ The verdict was upheld by a higher court in December 2003.¹⁰¹

The “reeducation” of imams in 2001 and 2002

Religious work “should be regarded as an important, radical measure to oppose ethnic splittism and preserve social and political stability.”¹⁰²

Xinjiang Party Secretary Wang Lequan, October 2002

In furtherance of the government’s objective of “keeping a handle on the ideological state of the imam at all times,”¹⁰³ the Chinese authorities in Xinjiang conduct “religious training campaigns” and “political reeducation campaigns.” These are similar to the notorious “patriotic education campaign” waged in Tibet against Buddhist monks and nuns since 1996.¹⁰⁴ The sessions, led and monitored by Party and government officials, are designed to compel religious personnel to openly express their opposition to “hostile forces”––in Tibet, the “Dalai lama clique,” and in Xinjiang, “separatist forces.”

The provincial, municipal, and district religious affairs bureaus regularly conduct training of clerics. The training of religious personnel (as well as the evaluation of the clerics) is carried out by the Third Bureau (Zongjiao sanchu 宗教三处) of the Xinjiang Ethnic Religious Affairs Committee [民族事务委员会 (宗教事务局)].¹⁰⁵ The Third Bureau “plans the training of religious personnel,” “reinforces the management of religious institutes and scriptures classes,” and “is responsible for the political education of religious personnel.”¹⁰⁶ The United Front Work Department¹⁰⁷and the China Islamic Association at the provincial and prefectural levels also contribute to the training sessions.¹⁰⁸

Since 2001, the frequency of these trainings apparently has increased from once every few years to once a year for the 8,000 registered imams above the township level.¹⁰⁹ The campaigns in 2001 and 2002 systematized the ideological control imposed on clerics.

The 2001 campaign was officially “the largest-scale religious training” since the founding of the People’s Republic of China, with 8,000 imams above the village level undergoing “political reeducation” between March 15 and December 23, 2001.¹¹⁰ The twenty-day “reeducation” sessions were aimed at “reestablishing correct ideological understanding and improving the political qualities of the religious leaders.”¹¹¹ In March 2002, it was announced that Islamic scripture schools would train 8,000 “patriotic religious personalities,” “2,000 of them to be trained by the region and 6,000 by the localities.”¹¹²

“Reeducation” and training sessions are obligatory and involve clerics from different areas of Xinjiang, who are divided into ethnically homogeneous working groups (Uighurs, Huis, Kazakh, etc.).¹¹³ Clerics are forced to listen to speeches by Party and government officials and must answer questions, orally and in writing, concerning the regulations pertaining to religious activities, Party doctrine, and positions on separatism. Each participant must submit a “study report” at the end of the training.¹¹⁴

During “exchange of experience” sessions (huxiang jingyan huiyi 互相经验会议), clerics are asked to address the other participants with precise accounts of “difficulties” or “incidents” they have encountered in their work. For instance, an imam will describe how “illegal” religious classes were held, or how the mosque used some “illegal” religious book. They may also relate how they failed to warn the authorities about “elements” that were “agitating,” or about inviting a cleric from another area without prior authorization. Clerics also have to admit personal errors and how they have nurtured “incorrect” ideas. They also have to point out examples of such erroneous actions on the part of other members of the group.¹¹⁵ 

These sessions are purposely designed as loyalty tests. If clerics do not offer precise accounts, they are viewed as being insincere about opposing separatism. But if they admit mistakes, they are considered guilty of violating regulations. This serves to put continuous pressure on the clerics. The imam’s “attitude” (taidu 态度––in this context a euphemism for political loyalty) is monitored by instructors during the training. Final evaluations are recorded in the imam’s personal file, which is kept by the religious affairs bureaus.

Clerics who do not fulfill the ideological criteria can be put through further “education session(s)” and have their accreditation suspended or removed. Local sources pointed out that these sessions were particularly taxing for old clerics from the countryside, who are forced to travel and are suddenly plunged into arcane testing of their ideological loyalty to the Party.¹¹⁶

 

The Xinjiang Daily, the official organ of the Xinjiang CCP Committee, portrays these sessions in a positive light, suggesting clerical appreciation for the “training”:

During the study, imam-students were very enthusiastic and listened attentively to lectures. Some of them were aged and weak but persevered in attending classes, actively took part in discussions, and wrote study reports.¹¹⁷

The same article reported that after the 2001 campaign clerics declared: “Now we have set our mind at rest and seen the light as if we had just walked out of a dense fog.”

According to secondary accounts given to Human Rights Watch,¹¹⁸ the climate of the training sessions is similar to accounts given by people forced to write self-criticisms during the Maoist era. Each session is a cat-and-mouse game, where the safest way to be left off the hook is to admit to relatively minor mistakes, if need be by inventing them. Such sessions are a core component of the political “reeducation” campaigns conducted for clerics since 2001.

The content of the courses, in which “political studies are combined with training in religious knowledge,” was “scientifically determined” by an ad hoc small group set up with leaders from the Regional Party Committee, the XUAR government, the State Administration of Religious Affairs, and the China Islamic Association:

The leading group deeply explored and scientifically determined the contents of courses by proceeding from the perspective of guiding religion in adapting to the socialist society and maintaining the lasting political stability of Xinjiang,” reported the Xinjiang Daily … Imam-students systematically studied General Secretary Jiang Zemin’s important speeches on religious issues, the Party’s ethnic and religious policies, relevant state laws and regulations, the history of Xinjiang, and the history of Xinjiang religions.¹¹⁹

The authorities also propagated selections of text from the Koran that were deemed suitable. “New Edition of Selections from the Koran” (Xinbian Kuerlan bian 新遍苦而滥编) was published by the Xinjiang Religious Affairs Bureau in August 2001. Religious bureaus of all districts, prefectures, and cities organized in a planned manner the work of testing, explaining, training, and diffusing the book, “obtaining great results,” according to official reports.¹²⁰

In October 2002, a Party- and government-sponsored regional conference on religious work was called in Urumqi to sum up the work of 2002 and lay out the plan for 2003. The Xinjiang Party Secretary, Wang Lequan, gave clear instructions to ensure that religious public figures were “politically qualified” and ordered his subordinates to further “monitor” and “expunge” religious publications.

We must strengthen the management of religious public figures, and be sure that they are politically qualified. This is a demand of the first order. Political qualifications are the following: an ardent love for the motherland, support for Communist Party leaders and the socialist system, opposition to national splittism and illegal religious activities, the defense of national unity and the unification of the motherland, and a conscious compliance with the nation's laws and policies

Control and conformity: supervision of mosques in 2001

Alongside efforts to step up ideological indoctrination of clerics, since 2001 the authorities have radically stepped up the monitoring and inspection of mosques. Among other things, inspections verify the accreditation of imams, ascertain that no “illegal” teaching is taking place, and ensure that government regulations are posted and available.

In line with instructions from the Central Party Committee in Beijing and the annual inspection regime prescribed in the Manual, the Xinjiang authorities initiated a campaign in 2001 to increase supervision of Uighur mosques. In August 2001, the Xinjiang Party Committee and the Xinjiang government convened a conference to discuss annual inspections of places of religious activities. This led to the design of a five-year-plan under an ad hoc “small leading group.” The group was set up the following November, and two teams, one for northern Xinjiang and one for southern Xinjiang, were charged with “coordinating and reinforcing the work of annual inspection of conformity.”¹²²  

According to the Xinjiang Religious Affairs Bureau, Xinjiang’s 23,909 mosques were inspected in 2001. One hundred forty-one mosques were found to be “non-conforming” and targeted for “rectification.” No figures are available for the following years.

In addition to the annual inspection of mosques, the authorities in 2001 established a “three-level religious control network” (sanji zongjiao guanli wangge 三级宗教管理网格), combining village, township, and district levels. The system establishes permanent monitoring of Uighur mosques by “leading cadres of ethnic minorities” who “maintain contacts with mosques and dialogue with religious personalities” and who control the mosque’s inspection log in which details about the clerics in charge, dates, results and recommendations of inspections, and other relevant information is recorded. The following account of the work to “strengthen the management of religious affairs” in Aksu prefecture of Xinjiang gives a picture of how the system works:

The City Religious Affairs Bureau issued an evaluation handbook to each of the liaison personnel for recording their work truthfully. The handbooks are examined and archived periodically… Aksu prefecture appointed ten ethnic minority leading cadres at the deputy county level as liaison personnel as well as 657 leading minority cadres… to establish contacts with 416 mosques

The persecution of clerics and the demolition of mosques

Chinese authorities are careful not to appear to be targeting Islam specifically, and they keep closures of mosques and the non-reaccreditation of imams secret. It is difficult to assess the number and scale of such actions. However, information found in scattered official sources suggests that retaliation against non-conforming mosques and clerics is prevalent and has gained new vigor since late 2001. At that time, authorities in Xinjiang imposed even more control on mosques, effectively banning any new construction work on mosques in Xinjiang. Although Uighur exile organizations have long claimed that such a ban was implemented after the 1997 Yining uprising, the measure was never officially confirmed and is not found in material issued by the Religious Affairs Bureau. However, in October 2002 the Xinjiang Party Secretary appeared to confirm the existence of the ban in a speech relayed by the Xinjiang Daily:

At this time, the places for religious activities throughout the Autonomous Region are adequate to meet the needs of the normal religious activities of religious believers. In principle we should not have to build new places for religious activities.¹²⁴

The Party Secretary also underscored limitations imposed on the preservation of existing mosques. He declared that, “any maintenance and repair of places for religious activities must reflect real needs and be concrete, safe and practical” and he stressed the ban on sharing costs of repairs with independent, non-governmental sources, such as private businessmen, without permission from the relevant authorities.¹²⁵

The destruction of a mosque by the authorities was reported in Hetian prefecture in southern Xinjiang in October 2001. Local worshipers demonstrated against the action; the demonstration was immediately put down by security forces. According to media reports, an official of Hetian Nationalities and Religious Affairs Bureau declared that about five people had opposed the conversion of a mosque into a carpet factory and appealed to regional and Beijing authorities when the project began, but eventually agreed to the factory conversion, which took place “because the mosque was located beside a school and considered too loud and a bad influence.”¹²⁶

The persecution of clerics did not start only after September 11, 2001. Official media sources reported in May 2001 that seven imams were arrested and two “underground mosques” destroyed in the provincial capital Urumqi. The charges against the men were not made public.¹²⁷ According to official documents, Yusaiyin Wubulibei, former Imam of the Shayibake Mosque in Urumqi, was demoted and put under investigation by the Public Security Bureau in April 1999 for having “preached against the religious policies of the Party” and “exacerbated contradictions within the patriotic clergy.”¹²⁸ No further information regarding the charges against him was available at the time of writing.

In Yili prefecture alone, local government sources state that seventy “illegal constructions or renovations of religious sites” were demolished and forty-four imams stripped of their “credentials” (zige 资格) between 1995 and 1999.¹²⁹ The official Urumqi Yearbook of 1999 cites the closure of “twenty-one illegal religious sites” and the arrest of a group of reactionary religious students in the regional capital Urumqi in 1998.¹³⁰ It recounts that the authorities “smashed up” numerous illegal preaching spots, confiscated two hundred volumes of reactionary books, and two hundred reactionary tapes and reactionary propaganda materials.¹³¹

The government has been careful to maintain a few showcase mosques that have undergone extensive renovation, such as the Id-Kah Mosque in Kashgar. Local residents complain that the ban on renovations and extensions is particularly stringent for Uighur mosques and more lax for mosques attended by Hui Muslims, who are ethnically distinct from Uighurs.

A Case of “Extremism”

China typically justifies the detention or defrocking of clerics as a response either to “illegal activities”—often activities integral to the free exercise of religion—or to “religious extremism,” a code term for terrorism. The general repression of religion in Xinjiang casts doubts on the legitimacy of many of these punishments, but very few independent and reliable accounts have surfaced.

The case presented here is particularly significant because it is found in a high-level document issued by the Study Group of the Xinjiang CCP Committee, the highest political authority in Xinjiang, as an example of what constitutes “extremism.” ¹³² It thus carries the full weight of the Party leadership and sets a political line that all Party members, including prosecutors, judges, and government cadres, should refer to in deciding on a case or carrying out decisions.

The report depicts the following incident as an example of what is termed “narrow-minded nationalist thinking” (xiazhai minzuzhuyi sixiang 狭窄民族主义思想):

“In the country, a few dangerous people with narrow-minded nationalist thinking are pushing national-ethnic self-respect and self-belief to extremism, inciting scorn and discrimination of other national-ethnic cultures…They one-sidedly debate a hot social issue, and fan feelings of dissatisfaction (buman qingxu 不满情绪) among the masses.”

In July and August 1999, the imam of the Sidituwei mosque in Hetian prefecture said in front of three or four thousand people during the Friday prayer:

“Because they are unemployed, Uighur women and youngsters have turned into prostitutes and vagrants. Pray Allah to save their souls, to give them jobs. Let the sound of our tears move Allah. A crowd of one thousand were thus led to cry loudly.”

This speech by the imam would normally be understood to be a piece of everyday social commentary, the expression of which would be covered by the rights to free expression and peaceful assembly. The choice of this speech as an example thus sends an unambiguous signal to all Party and government cadres that raising “hot social issues” (shehui redian wenti 社会热点问题), and spurring “feelings of dissatisfaction” is equivalent to separatism.

[96] The precise registration procedure is detailed in National Bureau of Religious Affairs, “Measures regarding the registration of places of religious activities,” April 13, 1994 [国务院宗教事务局: 宗教活动场所登记办法, 1994年4月13日].The regulations specify that registration can be downgraded to a one or two year “temporary registration” if problems are found, or suspended for “rectification.”

[97] Human Rights Watch interviews in Kashgar, July 1999.

[98] Ren Jieling, Li Yulin, “A Cursory Discussion of the Characteristics of "Three Categories of Persons” Undergoing Rehabilitation Through Labor and How to Manage Them,” Crime and reform studies, 2001 [任杰灵， 李毓林“浅谈“三类劳教人员”表现特征及管理的对策,”犯罪与改造研究， 2001年第４期].

[99] Quoted in “Bingtuan Supreme Court Affirms Jail Terms for Uighur Youths,” Radio Free Asia, December 23, 2003.

[100] “Bingtuan Supreme Court Affirms Jail Terms for Uighur Youths,” Radio Free Asia, December 23, 2003.

[101] Ibid.

[102] Editorial, Xinjiang Daily [新疆日报], October 13, 2002, FBIS, November 5, 2002 [CHI-2002-1029].

[103] "Unequivocally Oppose National Separatism, Illegal Religious Activities,” Xinjiang Daily [新疆日报], August 16, 1998, in "Xinjiang Official on Opposing Separatism," FBIS, October 18, 1998 [CHI-98-291].

[104] See Tibetan Information Network and Human Rights Watch (joint report), Cutting Off the Serpent's Head: Tightening Control in Tibet (New York: Human Rights Watch, 1996).

[105] Website of the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region People’s Government: http://www.xj.gov.cn/zfjg/mzz.php (retrieved May 26, 2004).

[106] Ibid.

[107] The United Front Work Department is responsible for the elaboration of polices and plans regarding ethnic and religious affairs, as well as “coordinating the relevant departments to carry out the fight against the activities of domestic and overseas separatist enemy forces such as the Dalai clique.” (Source: Official Website of the United Front Department, http://www.zytzb.cn/zytzbwz/index.htm (in Chinese)).

[108] The sessions lasted 10 days on average in 2001. Xinjiang Daily, December 21, 2001 [新疆日报，2001年1月21日].

[109] “Mosque Leaders’ Reeducation Campaign Stepped Up,” South China Morning Post, November 14, 2001; Xinjiang Daily [新疆日报], December 21, 2001, FBIS, January 23, 2002 [CHI-2002-0117].

[110] Xinjiang Daily [新疆日报], December 21, 2001, FBIS, January 23, 2002 [CHI-2002-0117].

[111]“Mosque Leaders’ Reeducation Campaign Stepped Up,” South China Morning Post, November 14, 2001.

[112] Xinjiang Daily [新疆日报], March 12, 2002, FBIS, March 14, 2002 [CHI-2002-0329].

[113] “Mosque Leaders’ Reeducation Campaign Stepped Up,” South China Morning Post, November 14, 2001; Xinjiang Daily [新疆日报], December 21, 2001, FBIS, January 23, 2002 [CHI-2002-0117].

[114] Ibid.

[115] Human Rights Watch interviews with relatives of two clerics, Kashgar, July 2000.

[116] Ibid.

[117] Xinjiang Daily [新疆日报], December 21, 2001, FBIS, January 23, 2002 [CHI-2002-0117].

[118] Human Rights Watch interviews with relatives of two clerics, Kashgar, July 2000.

[119] Xinjiang Daily [新疆日报], December 21, 2001, FBIS, January 23, 2002 [CHI-2002-0117].

[120] Xinjiang Annals 2002 (Urumqi: Xinjiang Yearbook Publishing House), 2003, p. 333. [新疆年鉴2002, 乌鲁木齐：新疆年鉴出版社，2003， 第333页].

[122] Xinjiang Annals 2002, p. 334.

[124] Xinjiang Daily [新疆日报], October 13, 2002, FBIS, November 5, 2002 [CHI-2002-1029].

[125] Ibid.

[126] The mosque was apparently turned into a carpet factory. “Mosque razed, 180 arrested,” South China Morning Post, October 14, 2001; “Arrests of mosque protesters denied,” South China Morning Post, October 16, 2001.

[127] Human Rights Watch, “China: Human Rights Concerns in Xinjiang,” October 2001, [online], http://www.hrw.org/backgrounder/asia/china-bck1017.htm.

[128] Yining Municipality Annals, Urumqi: Xinjiang People’s Press, 2002 [伊宁市志, 乌鲁木齐：新疆人民出版社, 2002].

[129] Urumqi Yearbook 2000 (Urumqi: Xinjiang People’s Press), 2001, pp.250-251. [乌鲁木齐年鉴 2000, 乌鲁木齐:新疆人民出版社, 2001, 250-251页].

[130] Urumqi Yearbook 1999  (Urumqi: Xinjiang People’s Press), 2000 [乌鲁木齐年鉴1999, 乌鲁木齐:新疆人民出版社, 2001, 250-251页].

[131] Ibid.

[132] Study Group of the Xinjiang Party Committee, “Investigative report on correctly apprehending and resolving Xinjiang’s nationality problem under the new situation,” February 2001 [中共新疆维吾尔自治区委组织部课题组：关于正确认识和处理形势下新疆民族问题的调查报告, 2001年2月].

VI. Controlling Religion in the Education System

Minors barred from “participating in religious activities” in Xinjiang

Although China prohibits religion within the state educational system nationwide,¹³³ there is no law prohibiting children from participating in public or private state-sanctioned religious activities.¹³⁴

The situation is markedly different in Xinjiang, where article 14 of the XUAR regulation entitled Implementation Measures of the Law on the Protection of Minors states that “parents and legal guardians may not allow minors to participate in religious activities.”¹³⁵ The implementation of the ban seems to vary from place to place, but some mosques display signs prohibiting the entry of anyone under eighteen years of age.¹³⁶ Uighur Muslims report that the ban is implemented against them more harshly than against members of other ethnic or religious groups, but it applies to all religions in the region.¹³⁷This ban on religious activity among children has no basis in Chinese law and is not known to exist anywhere else in China. The national Law on the Protection of Minors¹³⁸ does not include this clause. Neither do similar implementation measures adopted by other provinces. Even Tibet does not have such stringent regulations. The Chinese government has always denied the existence of such a prohibition, which contradicts both China’s own constitution¹³⁹ and international legal obligations.¹⁴⁰

In Kashgar, people complained that even talking about religion to their children was fraught with risks. One Kashgar educator put it this way:

This is a Uighur school and we are mostly Uighurs working here. But neither at home nor at work are you supposed to talk to the children about religion. You just talk about it and it is illegal. Even with my own son, I am not supposed to tell him about Islam. How can this be possible?¹⁴¹

Parents cannot avoid these strictures by sending their children abroad to study. In addition to barring private religious education in Xinjiang, the 1996 directives also imposed strict controls on exchanges with the outside world, stressing that “elementary and high school students from the border regions are not allowed to attend the elementary and high schools of foreign countries.”¹⁴² The directives instruct relevant authorities to “severely restrict elementary and high schools from developing cultural exchange programs with schools in foreign countries” and to “tightly limit cultural exchange activities such as foreign teachers teaching at Xinjiang schools.”¹⁴³ Instead, the directives establish political loyalty as the principal criterion for allowing students to study abroad.¹⁴⁴

Purging the schools of religion

In Xinjiang, restrictions on religion in state educational institutions go far beyond prohibiting the teaching of religion. Xinjiang authorities are actively hostile to any action that may encourage religious interest among the young. The Urumqi Manual (discussed in Chapter IV, above) details the following “policy restrictions” on religion in the educational system at all levels, including the university level:

1. no religious activities to be carried out at schools;
2. no religious classes or preaching of religious beliefs, no obstruction to education on morality and scientific culture;
3. no coercing or seducing students to take up religious beliefs; no activities that would enhance the development of religious followers;
4. no school at the secondary level or below may adopt teaching materials that promote religious belief; all teaching materials on religion adopted by the university must be examined by the administrative department responsible for education above the province level [in Beijing];
5. no teacher may violate the rules by leading the students to participate in religious activities; foreign teachers are forbidden to engage in the preaching of religion at school.¹⁴⁵

The political sensitivity of religion, and particularly religion as it contributes to Uighur social and cultural identity, is evident from the case of a Uighur professor at a higher education institution in Xinjiang who was banned from teaching local musical traditions. He described these events:

That is how it has gone with me, and mind you I am not what you would call a fervent Muslim. Only during class I would often talk about religious songs. They are widespread; it is absurd that you are not allowed to speak about it. It is an important part of our musical history and tradition, which is what I was supposed to teach. But then, the next term they [the school authorities] tell me not enough students enrolled in my course, which is not true. So I have not taught for a year now. They have not dismissed me and I should not complain too much because I still eat the bread of the Communist Party, but I just walk around campus or sit at my desk. It is a total waste, but it is better not to talk about it.¹⁴⁶

Beginning in 2001, schools in numerous localities across Xinjiang underwent “clean-ups”. Books which had “separatist content” were removed from libraries, teachers were investigated and reportedly fired, and students were warned that they were monitored and would be expelled if they did not conform to the new ideological requirements.

A report issued by the Hetian CCP Committee on January 5, 2002, ordered educational authorities to “clean up and reorganize the schools, their leaders, and the teaching body so as to turn schools into a stronghold against separatism and infiltration.”¹⁴⁷

Do not allow religion to corrupt the schools; do not allow anyone to teach school children ethnic separatism or to publicize religious ideas. Remove textbook contents which inspire ethnic separatism and publicize religious ideas. … Since we launched our battle against Eastern Turkestan separatist forces, we found that religion, illegal religious activities and extremist religious thought have severely influenced, disturbed and infiltrated society and villages, and in particular education.¹⁴⁸

Virtually any dissent or outward expression of religious belief is banned in schools. Forms of dress or outward appearance deemed too closely associated with traditional practices of Islam, such as men with beards or women with headscarves, are banned from schools. In Kashgar, for instance, a female teacher in a public education institution told Human Rights Watch how this ban affected practicing Muslim women teachers:

My husband allows me to work here, even if he is upset that now all state jobs forbid you to wear even a little scarf over your head, or something as small as a handkerchief. I am lucky: many colleagues of mine were told by their husbands that they could not go out in the street and into work with their heads uncovered, and simply had to quit their jobs.¹⁴⁹

Even performing the most basic requirements of the Islamic faith, such as reading the Koran, engaging in daily prayer, and fasting during the holy month of Ramadan, have been prohibited. In November 2001, a female student was reportedly expelled for disobeying school orders to stop performing five daily prayers. She was praying in her dormitory room when discovered.¹⁵⁰ The same report quoted a member of the staff of the Kashgar Teachers’ College as saying, “Teachers and administrators have been asked to sign statements saying they will accept responsibility if any student in their class is caught fasting.”¹⁵¹

Uighur students at Xinjiang University, Kashgar Teachers’ College, and Yining Teacher’s College all told Human Rights Watch that all religious attitudes and practices are forbidden, praying is impossible for fear of reprisals, and the mere fact of having a Koran or any religious publication is considered grounds for expulsion.

Non-teaching personnel in schools also have had to discard religious practices. A relative of a Uighur working in an office in a Kashgar school interviewed by Human Rights Watch recounted that simply sporting a beard was too much:

I managed to set up some business with other relatives, and that is my pride. I was working before in an office, dealing with food supplies for schools, but then they said: “No beards allowed in here. Not even mustaches.” I thought how can they tell me what I do with myself? This is our tradition, nobody’s business. So I had an opportunity to leave, and I left. But if you cannot find another job, in the private sector, you either shave or starve.¹⁵²

Such anecdotal accounts about interference with even the private exercise of religious freedom by students and teachers were confirmed by an official document obtained by Human Rights Watch. A letter was sent by the authorities of the Xinjiang School of Forestry to some parents on July 15, 1999, quoting regulations from the Autonomous Region Education Commission. The letter warned the parents that their children “have been praying and keeping fast, [and have been] involved in some religious activities” and that “if this behavior is seen again the students will be expelled.” The document states that “praying, keeping fasts and other religious activities” are explicitly banned by an official directive, “Document No. 5 (1996) of the Autonomous Region Education Commission,” and by “our school rules.”

These restrictions are still in place. In November 2004, an official from a county-level Chinese Communist Party religious affairs committee told Radio Free Asia that they had been ordered to report anyone fasting during the month of Ramadan:

“We have an agreement with the Chinese government that I am responsible for preventing students from fasting during Ramadan,” said the official, who declined to be identified. “If I find out that any of them have been fasting I have to report it.”¹⁵³

Enforcement through surveillance

“Education branches should pay special attention to the investigation and organization of teaching in schools.” ¹⁵⁴

Political Bureau of the Chinese Communist Party

In Xinjiang today, both students and teachers are subjected to surveillance by school authorities, the CCP, and Party-affiliated organizations. In addition, there is an elaborate network of section directors, class heads, and others who are held responsible if any case of dissident behavior appears. The denunciation of any “suspect” act is strongly encouraged, resulting in a general climate of fear and mutual suspicion.

For example, in Kashgar Teacher’s College, students complained that there were random searches in the dormitories at least twice a year, and that anyone caught possessing religious or politically sensitive materials risked expulsion from the college. The students expressed a constant fear that they might be overheard and mentioned cases of fellow students having been expelled for expressing political opinions, criticisms of the Party or government policies, or because they had “talked about religion.” Uighur sources allege that a schoolteacher in Kashgar’s Mush district, Abdhurahman, was dismissed on the grounds of “possession of incorrect books” and “religious activities.”¹⁵⁵

Political “witch-hunts” within schools in Xinjiang are confirmed by the authorities themselves, who acknowledge having set up “information networks” (xinxi wang 信息网) in schools linked to the Public Security Bureau. In 2001, Liu Baojian, the Party’s Deputy-Secretary of Kizilsu Tadjik Autonomous Prefecture, stated:

In every school we have established an information network integrated with the local police station, with the teachers in charge of a class acting as the basis [of a network] comprised of classroom heads, section heads, teaching offices and school directors.¹⁵⁶

He added candidly that the objective was to “control (zhangwo 掌握) the evolution of the thinking of the pupils … in order to teach and ‘guide’ them.”¹⁵⁷

Special campaigns

As a complement to the structural elements of political control described above, the authorities have launched periodic campaigns to enforce patriotic education and indoctrinate students against separatist ideology and illegal religious activities. The May 2001 campaign illustrates this approach. In an article entitled “Closely Monitor the Education of Youngsters” published in the Xinjiang Daily on May 15, 2001, the Xinjiang Propaganda Department emphasized that “education is the most important front in the fight against separatism.” The article continued:

The stability of schools is not only related to the stability of the whole society, but also to the long-term stability of Xinjiang. Strengthening the educational training of youngsters and the political thinking of the teachers is a very important part of the work of preserving the social stability of Xinjiang and opposing on a daily basis the battle against separatism.¹⁵⁸

Two days later, the authorities declared that an anti-crime “Strike Hard” campaign–– periodic drives against serious crime conducted throughout China––was to be extended to the education system, “Strike Hard Rectification Does Not Forget to Educate Youngsters about the Legal System,”¹⁵⁹ read a headline in the Xinjiang Daily, announcing that institutes of higher learning throughout the region were to be subjected to a “three rectification” drive.¹⁶⁰ Speaking at a “reeducation” mobilization meeting in February 2002, Xinjiang Party Secretary Wang Lequan stressed again the fact that political loyalty was to be placed above anything else.¹⁶¹

 

According to parents, students, and teachers across Xinjiang with whom Human Rights Watch spoke, the political climate deteriorated sharply in 2001-2002, with the authorities organizing numerous rallies against separatism which teachers and students were forced to attend. One Uighur teacher in Kashgar interviewed for this report described this process of ongoing indoctrination:

I have had no holidays for three years, because when we do have holidays we are supposed to go and study anti-separatism, anti-this and anti-that. I cannot tell you the stuff we have to study. Still, if you want to work, or need the pay, what else can you do? You go and read that stuff as if it made sense.¹⁶²

As described in the next section, these propaganda campaigns against separatism often converged with anti-crime sweeps of putative “separatists.” 

[133] The constitution stipulates that religion should not “interfere with the educational system of the State” (art. 36), while the Education Law states that “No organization or individual may make use of religion to conduct activities that interfere with the educational system of the State.” (art. 8).

[134]The U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child states: “For the purposes of the present Convention, a child means every human being below the age of eighteen years unless under the law applicable to the child, majority is attained earlier.” Convention on the Rights of the Child, art. 1, adopted November 20, 1989 (entered into force, September 2, 1990). In the report, the terms child or children is sometimes used to .acknowledge the relationship between two or more persons.

[135] Standing Committee of the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Regional People’s Congress, Implementation Measures of the Law on the Protection of Minors, September 25, 1993 [新疆维吾尔自治区人民代表大会常务委员会: 新疆维吾尔自治区实施‘未成年人保护法’办法, 1993年9月25日].

[136] Statement by Dr. Jacqueline Armijo (Acting Assistant Professor, Religious Studies, Stanford University) to the United States Congressional-Executive Commission on China, July 24, 2003 (http://www.cecc.gov/pages/hearings/072403/armijo.php#_edn1).

[137] Implementation of the ban for Xinjiang Catholics has been reported as recently as September 2003. A Catholic priest in Yining city, Father Song Zunsheng, reported to UCA News in September 2003 that government officials had banned people younger than eighteen, as well as all students, teachers, soldiers, and government officials from practicing any religion and taking part in any religious activity. He reported that two government officials guarded the entrance of the city's only church from April to June 2003 and drove away any children who may have wanted to enter it. “Government Restrictions Hamper Church Development in Remote Muslim Area,” UCA News, September 22, 2003.

[138] Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress, Law of the People’s Republic of China on the Protection of Minors, September 9, 1991 [国 人 民 代 表 大 会 常 务 委 员 会: 中华人民共和国未成年人保护法), 1991年9月4日].

[139] Constitution of the People’s Republic of China, Art. 36 [中华人民共和国宪法, 第三十六条].

[140] The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), which China ratified in March 2001, enshrines the rights of the parents to provide religious education: “States parties undertake to have respect for the liberty of parents (…) to ensure the religious and moral education of their children in conformity with their own convictions.” (art. 13). The Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), to which China is also a party, stipulates that “States Parties shall respect the right of the child to freedom of thought, conscience and religion.” (art. 14). See also the Convention against Discrimination in Education (CDE) which prohibits “any distinction, exclusion, limitation or preference which, being based on…religion…has the purpose or effect of nullifying or impairing equality of treatment in …” (art. 1). China ratified the CDE on February 12, 1965.

[141] Human Rights Watch interview with informant B, Kashgar, June 2002.

[142] “Record of the Meeting of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the Chinese Communist Party concerning the maintenance of Stability in Xinjiang (Document 7),” reproduced in Human Rights Watch, “China: State Control of Religion: Update #1,” March 1998.

[143] Ibid.

[144] “When choosing students for study abroad, pay great attention to their attitude and their actual behavior. Do not send those without a good attitude. Concerned branches should tightly control their criteria in this respect when investigating and permitting students with political backgrounds to go abroad for study with their own money.” Ibid.

[145] Manual, p. 31.

[146] Human Rights Watch interview with informant C, Urumqi, June 2002.

[147] “Separatists Alleged to have infiltrated Xinjiang Schools,” Agence France-Presse, January 31, 2002.

[148] Ibid.

[149] Human Rights Watch interview with informant B, Kashgar, June 2002.

[150] “China cracks down on its Muslims,” Agence France-Presse, November 23, 2001.

[151] Ibid.

[152] Human Rights Watch interview with informant D, Kashgar, June 2002.

[153] “China Steps Up Religious Controls Over Muslim Uighurs,” Radio Free Asia, November 17, 2004.

[154] “Record of the Meeting of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the Chinese Communist Party concerning the maintenance of Stability in Xinjiang (Document 7),” reproduced in Human Rights Watch, “China: State Control of Religion: Update #1,” March 1998.

[155] World Uighur Network News (WUNN), April 4, 2002. The information was not corroborated by other media.

[156] “Comprehensive Public Order: Urging Stability from the Small to the Large,” Xinjiang Legal Daily, May 17, 2001 [“宗治:由小到大促稳定,” 新疆法制报， 2001年5月17日].

[157] Ibid.

[158] “Highly monitor the education training of young pupils,” Xinjiang Daily, May 15, 2001 [“高度重视对青少年的倍养教育,” 新疆日报, 2001年5月15日].

[159] “Strike Hard Rectification Does Not Forget to Educate Youngsters about the Legal System,” Xinjiang Legal Daily, May 17, 2001 [“严打整顿不忘青少年法制教育,” 新疆法制报, 2001年5月17日].

[160] Ibid.

[161] Xinjiang Daily [新疆日报], February 9, 2002, FBIS, March 25, 2002.

[162] Human Rights Watch interview with informant B, Kashgar, June 2002.

VII. Anti-Crime Campaigns and Religious Repression

The Chinese government has periodically engaged in “Strike Hard” anti-crime campaigns that sweep up thousands, sometimes tens of thousands, of alleged criminals in their wake. Intended to instill a sense of security in a public concerned about the increase in crime that has accompanied economic growth, these campaigns commonly result in the unlawful arrest and even wrongful execution of large numbers of people.¹⁶³

According to Amnesty International, over 200 death sentences were recorded in Xinjiang as a result of such campaigns between 1997 and 2003, mostly under state security charges.¹⁶⁴ Only a fraction of death penalty sentencing appears in the press, and undisclosed overall figures are classified as state secrets.

The last recorded instance of an execution for a separatist crime was in March 2003. The alleged offender, Shaheer Ali, had been forcibly repatriated from Nepal despite having been recognized as a refugee by the United Nation High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). After repatriation he was tried secretly on separatism and terrorism charges.¹⁶⁵

Local officials, anxious to show they are giving full attention to the campaigns, frequently appear to be more concerned with numbers than evidence. The characteristics of the Strike Hard campaign in Xinjiang mirror those observable in China more generally: summary trials, pressure on the judiciary to process a large number of cases in an extremely short time, and mass sentencing rallies. But in Xinjiang, religion appears to be as much the target as crime.

Chinese officials in Xinjiang equate the campaigns waged against ordinary crime with those targeting separatism, terrorism, and purported “illegal religious activities.” The CCP frequently claims that “separatists and anti-China forces use the cloak of religion to fan national separatism.”¹⁶⁶ 

Unrelenting crackdowns

Since 1996, the authorities have conducted at least nine province-wide anti-crime campaigns in Xinjiang that specifically included purported “illegal religious activities”:

1996: First “Strike Hard” campaign specifically targeting “splittism and illegal religious activities”;

1997: “Rectification of Social Order” campaign;

1998: “People’s war” drive against “separatist and religious extremists”;

1999: “Special 100 Days Strike Hard Fight” and “General Campaign against Terrorism”;

2000: “Focused Rectification of Religious Places Campaign”;

2001: Two-year “Strike Hard” launched, to last until June 2002;

2002: Post-September 11 “High Pressure Strike Hard” campaign;

2003: Launch of a special “100 Days Strike Hard” in October;

2004: “High Pressure Strike Hard” campaign against “separatism, religious extremism and terrorist forces” extended indefinitely.

Official accounts of these campaigns usually claim hundreds of arrests. Summary trials and sentencing is common, as courts are under orders to reduce judicial process to a minimum under the principle known as “the two basics” (liang ge jiben 两个基本). This principle sets out that only “basic truth” and “basic evidence” are required to proceed. According to instructions given by Xinjiang Party Secretary Wang Lequan at the outset of the 2001 Strike Hard campaign: “As long as the basic truth is clear and as long as the basic evidence is verified, prompt approval of arrest, prosecution, and court decisions are required.”¹⁶⁷

Security and judicial bodies are also put under pressure to achieve arrest, sentencing, and mass rally quotas. This ideologically charged climate regarding any perceived form of dissent nullifies the already minimal procedural protections enjoyed by defendants in the Chinese judicial system.

Judges and court personnel in Kashgar are explicitly instructed to follow “political criteria” in carrying out their work. On the basis of the principle that “political criteria come first in the combat against separatism,” in 2003 the authorities designated as a target for “investigation and rectification” court officials whose “political ideas are not strong, who waver at the critical moment, and who do not want to shoulder leading responsibilities [in the fight against separatism],” according to an official account published on a website of the Supreme People’s Court.¹⁶⁸

These anti-crime campaigns are specifically intended to include the targeting of religious activity. According to government accounts, the 1998 “People’s War” campaign, which led to the arrest of “several hundred terrorists,”¹⁶⁹ imposed a “tightening of control on religion.”¹⁷⁰ Authorities closed twenty-one “illegal religious spots” and arrested one group of reactionary “Talebs” (religious students) in Urumqi.¹⁷¹ In 1999, the “Special 100 Days Strike Hard” campaign featured religion, as one of the “three elements” targeted for crackdown. They included “leading elements of religious extremist forces,” “hardcore ethnic separatists,” and “violent terrorists.”¹⁷²

In 2000, the crackdown focused on “the rectification of religious venues” and led to the arrest of religious activists preaching “a Holy War” in Hetian, Kashgar, Aksu, Ili, and other places.¹⁷³ The authorities reported that they had closed sixty-four “illegal teaching venues” and seized a large number of “illegal publications” and “reactionary tapes and videotapes.”¹⁷⁴ The reports also mentioned that religious activists preaching “a Holy War” had been contained in Hetian, Kashgar, Aksu, Ili, and other places.¹⁷⁵ In April 2001, China’s Minister of Public Security disclosed that he had instructed the Autonomous Region in Xinjiang to carry out a two-year Strike Hard campaign aimed at “eliminating separatism and illegal religious activities.”¹⁷⁶

Information on the extent of the post-September 11 anti-crime campaigns has been severely curtailed, but local accounts tell of an even more tense and repressive climate. As the Chinese government embarked on an effort to convince international observers of the legitimacy of its crackdown on Xinjiang’s Uighurs, local media apparently stopped carrying periodic reports on the results of these campaigns, which often had featured information such as numbers of people arrested and convicted, names of such individuals, and details of their sentences. A report on January 1, 2002 provided a rare insight into the extent of the post-September 11 crackdown, indicating that security forces had arrested 166 “violent terrorists and other criminals” in a campaign from September 20 to November 30, 2001.¹⁷⁷

In 2002 and 2003, the authorities continued to wage a “strike hard, high pressure” campaign against the purported “three forces”––separatists, religious extremists, and terrorists. Official media reported in January 2004 that, “during the past twelve months, Xinjiang suppressed a number of terrorist and separatist gangs, and arrested numerous criminals.”¹⁷⁸ No accounts of the trials were disclosed.

In September 2004, Xinjiang Party Secretary Wang Lequan disclosed that in the first eight months of the year, Chinese authorities had prosecuted twenty-two cases of groups and individuals for alleged “separatist and terrorist activities.” He said that courts in Xinjiang had passed fifty sentences, including an unspecified number of death sentences¹⁷⁹ Because stringent state secrets regulations apply to religious and ethnic affairs, more time will be needed before the true picture of the scale and intensity of the most recent campaigns emerges.

Sweeps by law enforcement agencies

According to local residents in the Yili, Kashgar, and Hetian prefectures, the past few years have seen an increase in intrusive and targeted sweeps conducted by law enforcement agencies, generally the Public Security Bureau in conjunction with the People’s Armed Police. Security forces seal off an area, such as a neighborhood or a village, and conduct house-to-house searches. Law enforcement officers examine identity cards and household residence permits (hukou 户口), interrogate residents about the whereabouts of family members, and randomly search houses for “illegal publications.” The definition of illegal publications includes copies of the Koran not printed by government presses. People whose papers are not in order, or who do not have a city residence permit while living in a city, or who in some other way fall outside of the regulations are taken away in trucks or minibuses waiting at the periphery, and then transported to public security facilities for further checks.

Indirect accounts tell of the often brutal character of these house searches. Because law enforcement agencies refuse to reveal the location where detainees are held after these sweeps, it is particularly difficult for relatives to know what actually happens to the detainees. Some people put in custody during sweeps are detained for long periods without charge; others are convicted or sent to reeducation through labor. Others are released.

Charges brought for offenses related to religion generally range from “disrupting public order” to “endangering state security.” Most of those detained are fined, and relatives maintain that in many cases corrupt officials force the family to “buy” their relatives freedom. “Problem” households—in which a family member has fallen afoul of the law, is imprisoned, is on the run, or is simply out of the country—are particularly vulnerable during sweeps.

The manner in which sweeps are conducted suggests that intimidation is one of the objectives. As one villager told Human Rights Watch:

In my home village [in Aktush prefecture], the militia regularly come to check villagers. They come during the night, searching house by house, and if they find religious material they take you for questioning. They say it’s “illegal religious publications.” My father is a simple farmer, what does he know if his Koran is illegal or not?¹⁸⁰

Many Uighurs interviewed for this report claimed that law enforcement agencies and officials are systematically using the campaign against separatism and illegal religious activities to elicit bribes, to impose arbitrary fines, and to blackmail families to pay for the release of their relatives in custody. One informant returning from Hetian told Human Rights Watch that following a crackdown on “illegal religious activities” in the area in spring 2003, many families had to pay for the release of their relatives, most of them young men between sixteen and twenty-five  years old.¹⁸¹ Complaints about widespread corruption among law enforcement officers are common. According to a young farmer from a village near Hetian:

Corruption! There is so much of it. You have to pay for everything, give presents to officials, to the police, etc. We even have to pay for the militia because officially “the people’s militia is supported by the people.” They take your property right in your home, but what can you do. If you complain to the authorities, they will retaliate or even label you a “trouble maker.” They call you “separatist” and you are finished. We are Uighurs, so we have no rights.¹⁸²

[163] See Human Rights Watch, World Report 2002, section “China and Tibet,” available at http://hrw.org/wr2k2/asia4.html. Legal scholars have written in details about the causal relation between “strike hard” campaigns and abuses. For instance, Professor Scott Tanner writes that “Police and procuratorial experts agree with the judgment of international human rights monitors that during “strike hard” anti-crime campaigns professionalism is further undermined, causing torture cases to spike. Local Communist Party leaders, who are also under evaluated by their superiors on the state of local social order, turn up the pressure on local police to solve cases quickly. According to one police official, many officers “find it hard to resist this fast and effective interrogation technique.” “Torture in China: Calls for Reform from within China's Law Enforcement System,” Prepared Statement to Accompany Testimony Before the Congressional-Executive Committee on China, July 26, 2002, available at www.cecc.gov.

[164] Amnesty International, “People's Republic of China: No justice for the victims of the 1997 crackdown in Gulja (Yining),” February 4, 2003, [AI Index: ASA 17/011/2003].

[165] Amnesty International, “China: Further information on Fear of Forcible Return,” October 24, 2003, [AI Index: ASA 17/037/2003].

[166] Protect the Unity of the Motherland: a Handbook (Urumqi: Xinjiang People’s Publishing House, 1996), p. 162. [维护祖国统一：简明读本 (乌鲁木齐：新疆人民出版社), 第162页].

[167] Xinjiang Daily [新疆日报], April 16, 2001, in “Xinjiang Party Secretary Addresses Meeting on Public Order,” FBIS, [CHI-2001-052].

[168] “Visible achievements in the political strengthening of Kashgar Intermediate Court,” Chinacourt.org, February 19, 2003 [“喀什中院政治建院凸显成效,” 中国法院网, 2003-02-19].

[169] “Hundreds of Muslim Activists Arrested,” South China Morning Post, February. 2, 1999.

[170] Ibid.

[171] Urumqi Yearbook 1999, p. 85.

[172] Xinjiang Yearbook 2000 (Urumqi: Xinjiang Yearbook Publishing House, 2001) [新疆年鉴2001, 乌鲁木齐：新疆年鉴出版社，2001], p. 95.

[173] Xinjiang Yearbook 2001 (Urumqi: Xinjiang Yearbook Publishing House, 2002) [新疆年鉴2002, 乌鲁木齐：新疆年鉴出版社，2002].

[174] Ibid.

[175] Ibid.

[176] Quoted in “PRC's Xinjiang Anti-Crime Campaign Targets Muslim Separatists,” Agence France-Presse, April 27, 2001.

[177] Xinjiang Daily [新疆日报], January 1, 2002.

[178] “Xinjiang deepens the Strike hard against the ‘three forces’: A number of terrorist gangs already suppressed ‘Xinjiang’,” China News Agency, January 17, 2004 [“深挖严打”三股势力”已打掉一批恐怖团伙,” 中新网, 2004年1月17日].

[179] “China convicts 50 to death in ‘terror crackdown,’” Reuters, September 13, 2004.

[180] Human Rights Watch interviews with informant E, Kashgar, July 1999.

[181] Human Rights Watch interview with an overseas scholar, Hong Kong, September 2003.

[182] Human Rights Watch interview with informant F, Hetian, July 1999.

VIII. Religious “Offenders” in Detention

The campaigns waged against “separatism” and “illegal religious activities” which gained momentum after 1996-1997 appear to have propelled a huge influx of Uighur prisoners into Xinjiang’s detention facilities.

There is a wide range of options available to the authorities in both the criminal and administrative systems for the prosecution of politically and religiously active Uighurs. In both systems, political instructions from the CCP and government have legal effect. For example, police and judges use CPP instructions to interpret the term “separatism” in the Criminal Code.

The conviction rate for criminal cases brought through the judiciary in the PRC is 98 percent, meaning that being indicted almost automatically results in a conviction.¹⁸³ Most testimonies by Uighurs who have been detained claim that they suffered from various forms of torture.¹⁸⁴ Of course, this makes convictions quite straightforward in a justice system with little regard for fair trial standards or the right to adequate defense counsel.

There are no “religious” crimes in Chinese law, so most “illegal religious activities” are prosecuted as other criminal or administrative offenses. The most serious are crimes of “endangering state security,” including “splitting the state” (fenlie guojia 分裂国家), “sabotaging the unity of the country” (pohuai guojia tongyi 破坏国家统一)¹⁸⁵ or incitement to these acts. Defendants charged with endangering state security have diminished procedural protections and face politically motivated prosecutions and harsh punishments.¹⁸⁶ Ordinary criminal provisions, more routinely applied, typically include those targeting illegal assembly, illegal processions, and the broad category of “disrupting public order.” Finally, the authorities make wide recourse to extra-judicial punishment such as reeducation through labor (RTL).

In prisons and RTL camps, Uighur political and religious prisoners are openly classified as a special category of detainees. Authorities refer to them as the “three types” (san lei renyuan 三类人员) or the “three categories of people” (san zhong ren 三种人).The “three types” designates detainees who have “harmed state security, joined illegal organizations, or distributed illegal religious material”; the “three categories” designates those who have “endangered state security, committed crimes with a view toward endangering state security, or are reactionary religious students or religious fanatics.”¹⁸⁷

Official sources show that among Uighur prisoners in Xinjiang there is an unusually high proportion of criminals sentenced for state security offenses. A rare documentary source obtained by Human Rights Watch, a scholarly paper from a Ministry of Justice compendium, shows that in 2001 9.2 percent of convicted Uighurs––one out of eleven, ––were serving prison time for alleged “state security crimes.” This probably amounts to more than 1,000 Uighur prisoners.¹⁸⁸

The sweeping scope of the law makes it difficult to discern which cases involved genuine criminal activity, such as violence against the state, and which were punishment for peaceful exercise of rights such as dissent or religious practice.

Ordinary criminal provisions are even more frequently applied to religious dissenters. Defendants have almost no recourse to challenge the charges levied against them. In most cases, the sentence is decided in advance by the authorities.¹⁸⁹ This lack of due process apparently is justified by the chain of reasoning that causally associates expression of dissenting views or engagement in unapproved activities with “illegal” religious activities, ethnic separatism, and finally, terrorism.

No comprehensive statistical information on the exact number of Uighur prisoners or even the general inmate population of Xinjiang is publicly available. The Chinese authorities regard such information as state secrets and have not allowed independent monitoring of detention facilities in Xinjiang. International organizations such as the International Committee of the Red Cross have not been able to reach agreement with the Chinese government concerning access to prisons, and a planned visit by the U.N. Special Rapporteur on Torture, which included Xinjiang, was abruptly cancelled in June 2004.¹⁹⁰

However, official documents relating both to prison and reeducation through labor¹⁹¹ acknowledge openly that there has been a surge in the number of Uighurs detained for religious offenses since the mid-1990s. Some of these sources indicate that the number of detentions has created severe management problems in these facilities.¹⁹²

The same documents stress that religious activities are strictly prohibited in prisons and reeducation through labor camps.¹⁹³

In mid-2001, Ren Tieling, the deputy chief of the Xinjiang Reeducation through Labor Bureau, published a detailed report discussing the characteristics of the “three categories of persons” detained in RTL camps in Xinjiang. A version of the report, redacted by removing confidential elements such as the number of detainees, was published in the Ministry of Justice journal, Crime and Reform Studies. The report acknowledged that, as of 2001, there had been a “sharply upward trend” in the number of people sent to RTL camps on religious or political grounds. As the numbers “increased annually,” RTL camps became “jam-packed.”¹⁹⁴

As we intensified our hitting power in recent years, an increasing number of those who joined illegal organizations, illegal publications and illegal religious groups…have been sent to be reeducated through labor. The number has increased annually and shown a sharp upward trend.¹⁹⁵

According to the report, in the Kashgar RTL center, a survey of 117 prisoners showed that the majority had been sentenced because they “joined illegal organizations, took part in meetings, paid organizations fees,” while some others “sheltered escaped criminals and hid their arms and ammunitions for them, or provided lodgings.”¹⁹⁶ 

The report also sheds important light on the composition of the prisoner population, and confirms the suspicion that most ethnic Uighurs picked up under the “three categories” rubric in Xinjiang are young men who have been sent there on the basis of their religious belief or activities. The article distinguishes four groups of offenders and their percentage in the reeducation through labor population:

(a) those who joined illegal organizations and/or engaged in illegal religious activities make up 46 percent of the total [of the “three categories of persons”];

(b) those who printed or distributed illegal periodicals for illegal propaganda purposes make up 27.2 percent;

(c) those who sheltered criminals or unlawfully possessed guns and ammunition, provided funds to illegal organizations, or made living quarters or places for activities available, 19.3 percent.;

(d) those who illegally made explosives or illegally crossed the border, 7.1 percent.¹⁹⁷

The same report relates that 85 percent of the convicts are between eighteen and thirty years old, a fact that mirrors the official focus on cracking down on incipient religious enthusiasm among the young.¹⁹⁸ The demographics indicate that the purpose of the operation is to discourage young Uighurs from engaging in religious activity.

For the authorities, the benefit of using RTL is that no judicial procedure is involved. Thus, the Public Security Bureau has a free hand to detain individuals for as long as four years without having to prove that they actually committed a crime.

[183] Law Yearbook of China (Beijing: China Legal Publishing House, 2003), [中国法律年鉴 （北京：中国法律出版社）,2003].

[184] See Amnesty International, “Gross Violations of Human Rights in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region,” April 1999 [AI Index: ASA 17/18/99].

[185] Criminal Law of the People’s Republic of China, Art. 103 [中华人民共和国刑法, 第一百零三条].

[186] See Human Rights in China and Human Rights Watch/Asia (joint report), "Whose Security? ‘State Security’ in China's New Criminal Code," A Human Rights Watch Report, vol. 9, no. 4, April 1997.

[187] “Studies on the Reeducation of China’s National Minorities Criminals,” in Lu Jialun, ed., Ministry of Justice’s Ministerial Level Topics Series (Beijing: Legal Publishing House, 2001), p. 125. [鲁加伦, “新疆劳教速写” in 中国少数民族罪犯改造研究 (北京:法律出版社-中国司法:部及课题丛书, 第125页]. The statistics refer to convicts in the normal criminal justice system, and not to detainees under reeducation through labor.

[188] Ibid.

[189] The instrumentalization of the judicial system for political ends remains a dominant feature of China’s legal system. According to Stanley Lubman, one of the foremost legal experts on China, “The Chinese criminal process remains dominated not only by the police, but by a blatant instrumentalism that puts it at the service of the CCP and political leaders when they wish to use it.” Stanley B. Lubman, Bird in a Cage: Legal Reform in China after Mao (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1999), p. 171.

[190] Human Rights in China, “Postponement of Torture Mission ‘Disappointing,’” June 16, 2004. [中国人权新闻发布, “中国人权关于中国政府再次推迟酷刑调查的声明,” 2004年6月16日].

[191] Reeducation through labor: (laodong jiaoyu [劳动教育]) is a system of extra-judicial detention and punishment, administratively imposed on those who are deemed to have committed minor offenses. The usual procedure is for the police acting on their own to determine a reeducation term. Sentences run from six months to three years' confinement in a camp or farm, often longer than for similar criminal offenses. A term can be extended for a fourth year if, in the prison authorities' judgment, the recipient has not been sufficiently reeducated, fails to admit guilt, or violates camp discipline.

[192] “The Course of the Work of Reeducation Through Labor in Xinjiang,” Crime and Reform Studies, January 2001. [“新疆劳教工作的历程,” 犯罪与改造研究, 2001年01月]. For the situation in prisons, see above “Studies on the Reeducation of China’s National Minorities Criminals,” in Lu Jialun, ed., Ministry of Justice’s Ministerial Level Topics Series (Beijing: Legal Publishing House, 2001).

[193] Article 2 of the Interim Provisions promulgated by the Justice Department of Xinjiang clearly stipulates that no religious activity is allowed in prisons and places of reeducation through labor: “Prisoners and persons undergoing rehabilitation through labor may not engage in any form of religious activity in prison or place of rehabilitation through labor during their term of imprisonment or incarceration. Activities such as fasting, prayer, worship or expounding the texts of Islam or Buddhism are prohibited.” Such regulations breach China’s own laws and regulations and basic international human rights standards. Article 42 of the U.N. Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners sets forth that “So far as practicable, every prisoner shall be allowed to satisfy the needs of his religious life by attending the services provided in the institution and having in his possession the books of religious observance and instruction of his denomination”; “Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners,” United Nations High Commission on Human Rights, 1957, [online] http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu3/b/h_comp34.htm.

[194] “The Course of the Work of Reeducation Through Labor in Xinjiang,” Crime and Reform Studies, January 2001, p. 23.

[195] “Studies on the Reeducation of China’s National Minorities Criminals,” in Lu Jialun, ed., Ministry of Justice’s Ministerial Level Topics Series (Beijing: Legal Publishing House, 2001).

[196] Ibid.

[197] “The Course of the Work of Reeducation Through Labor in Xinjiang,” Crime and Reform Studies, January 2001, p. 23.

[198] Ibid.

X. Recommendations

To the government of the People’s Republic of China:

The government should halt the persecution of Uighurs for exercising their right to practice their own religion and their right to hold their own religious beliefs. We recommend:

1. Senior government and Party officials should explicitly affirm that the independent practice of religion, peaceful dissent, and advocacy for Uighur autonomy do not constitute criminal acts.
2. Religion in Xinjiang, and the practice of Islam in particular, should not be subject to government interference or approval, save for those legal regulations necessary in a democratic society to protect national security, public security, health, order, and morals. In particular, the recruitment and training of clergy, the conduct of and attendance at religious services, the establishment and management of places of worship, the celebration of religious events and holidays, the writing and publication of religious material, and the provision of all levels of religious education, should be presumptively lawful and without need of prior approval.
3. The right of children and young adults to worship, obtain religious education, and express their religion, including through dress, should be respected. The right of parents and legal guardians to provide religious education to their children likewise should be respected.

Thorough legal reform is an urgent requirement if China is to fulfill its obligations to respect freedom of religion, association, expression, and assembly; the right of minorities to their own culture; the right of parents to educate their children; and the right of all to liberty and freedom against its arbitrary deprivation. To this end, we recommend that Chinese authorities:

1. Repealthe Xinjiang Provisional Regulations on Religion and bring national regulations on religion and freedom of association into conformity with international law and standards.
2. Amend guidelines for religious freedom, such as the 2000 Manual, to conform with China’s obligations under international law. Guidelines such as those found in the Manual are problematic because they go far beyond what the regulations require, reflect the primacy of political criteria over law, and do not take into account international law.
3. Publicly disclose all laws and regulations applicable to religious practice in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous region.
4. Ensure that peaceful religious observance and practice is neither equated with nor incurs liability for state security offenses.
5. Amend article 36 of the constitution to explicitly protect the right to manifest one’s religious beliefs without state interference.

The unjustified detention, maltreatment, and torture of Uighur religious prisoners should halt immediately, and all those imprisoned for their peaceful religious practices or religious beliefs should be freed. To this end, we recommend:

1. No person be imprisoned for the practice or expression of his or her own religious beliefs.

2. No person be imprisoned or remanded to reeducation through labor without fair trial guarantees, including a public hearing, the right to be represented or advised by counsel of choice, the right to present a defense and to invoke and rely upon constitutional and human rights, the right to a presumption of innocence, and the right to appeal to a judicial authority.

3. Prisons, labor camps, lock-ups and all other places of detention should be open to inspection; mechanisms to detect and investigate allegations of maltreatment and torture should be put in place; the use of evidence obtained by torture should be strictly outlawed; and the punishment of those who torture or maltreat detainees assured.

4. The U.N. Special Rapporteur on Torture, the U.N. Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief, and the U.N. Working Group on Arbitrary Detention should be invited to visit Xinjiang and, in accordance with their working methods, observe conditions and make recommendations for reform.

5. The government should make publicly available information on all persons in Xinjiang detained or imprisoned for offenses related to religion in Xinjiang, including individuals brought before the courts and the reeducation through labor committees.

To the international community:

China has sought to justify its crackdown on any manifestation of an autonomous Uighur identity as necessary to suppress “terrorism.” The international community should challenge the legitimacy of this claim and make it clear that the burden is on China to prove this link in each case. The international community should make it clear to China that its overbroad and repressive policies in Xinjiang deepen local resentment and risk further destabilizing the region, and that such policies harm the credibility and conduct of global anti-terrorism efforts.

1. Countries that conduct intelligence and criminal cooperation with China should insist that any cooperation be contingent on respect for human rights guarantees, and should urge China to distinguish between conduct that is genuinely criminal and peaceful dissent, such as expressions favoring Uighur autonomy and independent manifestations of religious belief.
2. Uighurs who flee China and request asylum should be offered protection from return to China pending resolution of their claims to asylum, and such claims should be processed and decided in accordance with international standards.
3. No country should cooperate in the return to China of Uighurs accused of crimes, including terrorism, until the proper treatment of returnees can be independently monitored and their rights to a fair trial assured. China’s practice of systemic torture of state security detainees and the particularly high rates of executions in Xinjiang make such returns unsafe and likely to violate the Convention Against Torture and the U.N. Refugee Convention.
4. Countries that engage in counter-terrorism strategies, consultations, and educational programs with China should pay special attention to policies in Xinjiang with a view toward assisting China in developing policies that are respectful of human rights.

To international organizations and mechanisms:

Just as China has become increasingly integrated into the world economy, it now needs to become fully integrated into the international system of human rights promotion and protection, particularly via the United Nations. The United Nations and other international mechanisms and international organizations should pay special attention to repressive policies in Xinjiang and the plight of Uighurs as an important deviation from China’s international obligations.

1. The U.N. Special Rapporteur on Torture should request that Xinjiang be on the itinerary of his projected visit to China so he might examine the treatment of those accused of religious or security offenses and advise on the implementation of mechanisms to ensure that human rights obligations are fully protected in counter-terrorism strategies.
2. The U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights should request China to report on measures it has taken to implement the 1994 recommendations of the Special Rapporteur on Religious Freedom with respect to Xinjiang as well as other parts of China.
3. The U.N. Working Group on Arbitrary Detention should write to the Chinese government raising concerns about those arrested and detained for religious practice, including those held in reeducation through labor camps, and should request an invitation to conduct a mission to Xinjiang.
4. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees should urge China to embark on reform of religious policy in Xinjiang to remove conditions that facilitate the persecution, and hence the flight, of religious Uighurs.
5. In advance of the Committee on the Rights of the Child’s September 2005 review of China’s state party report to the Committee on the steps it has taken to give effect to the rights in the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the Committee should ask China what it has done to protect the right of children in Xinjiang to manifest their religion and receive religious education.
6. The Counter-terrorism Committee of the United Nations should call on China to abide by its obligations under international human rights standards when pursuing counter-terrorism strategies, and should assist China in establishing a long-term plan for doing so.

To international donors and aid groups working in Xinjiang, including the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank

1. As part of working agreements with Xinjiang authorities, require independent monitoring of discrimination against Uighurs and other ethnic minority groups in access to assistance and services. 
2. Require consultation with independent NGOs on policies and regulations that affect Uighur and other ethnic communities.
3. Support the development of independent NGOs run by Uighurs and other ethnic groups in Xinjiang. Advocate for the reform of national, provincial, and local laws and regulations on religion to ensure that:

i. individuals and groups are free to practice their religion without having to register;

ii. freedom of religion is not limited by national security clauses;

iii. governmental discretion in application of religious regulations is constrained by criteria that accord with international standards, clear definitions, transparent processes, and procedural protections including opportunities for affected parties to challenge alleged abuses of discretion;

iv. no Chinese official intervenes in internal religious affairs through substantive review of ecclesiastical structures, religious appointments, or religious materials.

4. Advocate for the rights to freedom of expression, assembly, and association for Uighurs and other ethnic groups in Xinjiang.
5. As part of any health or humanitarian program in Xinjiang’s prisons and detention facilities, monitor conditions and reports of abuse and raise any concerns with Chinese authorities.
6. In all humanitarian programs, distribute in Chinese, Uighur, and other local languages translations of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, the Convention Against Torture, the Convention on the Rights of the Child, and other international human rights documents.
7. Support technical assistance programs to assist the Chinese government in creating legal clinics serving Uighurs and other Xinjiang ethnic groups.

Appendices

Appendix I: Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region Regulations on the Management of Religious Affairs (2001)

Editor’s note: The following is the full text of the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region Regulations on the Management of Religious Affairs, promulgated July 7, 1994, and amended July 16, 2001. The amendments were adopted by the Chairman’s Committee of the Xinjiang People’s Regional Congress and were appended to compilations of religious regulations circulated solely to local religious affairs bureaus for their internal use. Government websites still list the non-amended version of the regulations as current.

Each 2001 amendment or partial change in an amendment is marked (new).

Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region Regulations on the Management of Religious Affairs (promulgated July 16, 1994; amended July 16, 2001)

Article 1 (new)

These regulations are formulated to protect citizens’ freedom of religious belief, regulate religious activities according to law, strengthen the management of religious affairs, and guide religion to adapt to a socialist society. The regulations are drawn up in accordance with the Constitution, the relevant laws and statutes, and in light of the actual conditions prevailing in the autonomous region.

Article 2

Citizens enjoy freedom of religious belief. No organization or individual may force citizens to believe in or not believe in religion. Citizens, religious believers or non-believers may not be discriminated against.

Article 3

The law protects the legal rights and interests of religious organizations and places of religious activities, normal religious activities and affairs of religious personnel, and normal religious activities of religious adherents. No organization or individual may violate or interfere with these rights.

Article 4

Religious activities must be conducted in accordance with the Constitution and the (relevant) laws and statutes. No organization or individual may restore abolished religious feudal privileges or repressive exploitative systems. Activities conducted in the name of religion that undermine the socialist system, the unification of the country, national unity and social stability, and are harmful to citizens’ physical and mental health are prohibited. Religion must not be used to interfere in the country’s executive, judicial, educational and marriage systems, and in the implementation of the family planning policies.

Article 5 (new)

Religious organizations and religious affairs must not be controlled by foreign religious forces. The principles of independence, acting on one’s own and operating by oneself must be upheld. Self-Government, Self-Propagation and Self-Support must be practiced.

Foreign organizations and individuals carrying out religious activities within the Autonomous Region shall be administered pursuant to the “People’s Republic of China: Regulations on the Supervision of the Religious Activities of Foreigners in China.”

Religious organizations and individuals from outside the Autonomous Region must also abide by these regulations.

Article 6

Citizens who are believers and those who are not, as well as followers of different religions, must respect one another, refrain from interfering with one another, seek common ground while reserving differences, and live in harmony. Disputes and discord must not be sown between believers and non-believers and among followers of different religions.

Article 7 (new)

The religious affairs bureaus of people’s governments above the county level together with the xiang (township) people’s governments are responsible for the administration of religious affairs within their respective jurisdictions. The relevant departments of people’s governments above the county level should, in accordance with their own responsibilities, work together with the religious affairs bureaus, so as to manage religious affairs successfully. The Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps should, in accordance with these regulations, assume responsibility for handling religious affairs within its jurisdiction.

Article 8

Under these regulations, the term clergy is defined as those citizens who profess a religion and who have been ordained for religious duties.

Article 9

Citizens who profess a religion must support the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party and the socialist system, love their country and abide by its laws, safeguard the unification of the motherland and national solidarity, and oppose national splittism and illegal religious activities.

Article 10

Clergy is recommended by the democratic management organization at the places for religious activities, agreed upon by citizen believers after discussion, and approved by the relevant religious organization and issued a certificate. The names must be reported to the religious affairs bureau of the county people’s government and put on record.

Article 11 (new)

Religious seminaries and schools and scripture (bible) classes approved by the people’s government should strengthen the training of patriotic religious personnel. No organization or individual may operate religious seminaries, schools or scripture (bible) classes without approval.

Clergy may, in accordance with the relevant provisions of the autonomous region and with approval (by the relevant authority), teach scripture students, and train young patriotic clergy. No organization or individual may secretly teach scripture students without approval.

Article 12 (new)

Clergy enjoy the following rights and privileges. They may:

(1) engage in religious and church (mosque) activities according to law;

(2) participate in the management of the place for religious activities where he or she belongs;

(3) receive religious education, engage in religious academic research and exchange.

Article 13 (new)

Clergy shoulder the following responsibilities. They must:

(1) love the country and the faith, abide by the laws and statutes of the state;

(2) accept the supervision of the religious affairs bureaus of the people’s government, the religious organization(s), and the democratic management organization of the places for religious activities.

(3) protect the buildings, cultural objects, facilities and the environment of the places for religious activities.

Article 14

During their tenure, the clergy should accept routine check by the religious organization. Those who are found to be incompetent to carry out their duties or who have violated the law should be removed from their positions by the religious organizations which had originally examined and approved their credentials. The matter should be reported to the religious affairs bureau of the county-level people’s government and put on record.

Article 15 (new)

Religious activities must not interfere with social order, production order, or work or life order.

Article 16 (new)

Religious activities must be carried out according to the on-the-spot principle. No organized mass religious activity which spans different localities is allowed. Clergy is not allowed to administer religious activities in different localities. Missionary work in any form by non-clergy personnel is prohibited.

Article 17 (new)

Pilgrimage activities are to be organized by the religious affairs bureaus of the people’s government and religious organizations. No other organization or individual may organize such activities.

Article 18

The places for religious activities under these regulations are the mosques, churches, Daoist temples and other designated places for citizen believers to engage in religious activities, established with the approval (of the relevant authorities).

The article contains a new paragraph: No organization or individual may do missionary work outside a place for religious activities.

Article 19

(1) All democratic management organizations of places for religious activities must petition and register with the religious affairs bureaus of people’s governments above the county level. Construction of new, remodeling of old or moving places for religious activities must be approved by the religious affairs bureaus of the people’s government above the county level, and then reported to and approved by the people’s government at the same level.

Article 20

The democratic management organization of a place for religious activities must apply for deeds for the land, woods, and buildings managed and used by the said place for religious activities, according to the relevant provisions of the state. 

Article 21

The relevant organization or individual that is remodeling or constructing new buildings, establishing commercial or service undertakings, holding displays or exhibitions, shooting movies or TV films on the premises administered by the place for religious activities, must obtain permission of the democratic management organization of the place for religious activities as well as the religious affairs bureaus of the people’s government above the county level, and go through the required formalities according to law. 

Article 22

Places of religious activities that have been listed as protected cultural relics or that are located in scenic areas shall have their cultural relics and environments managed and protected in accordance with the provisions in relevant laws and regulations, under the guidance and supervision of relevant departments.

Article 23 (new)

(2) Members of the democratic management organization of a place for religious activities are democratically elected from among the citizen believers and the clergy who belong to the place for religious activities, under the guidance of the local religious organization. 

Article 24 (new)

The democratic management organization of a place for religious activities may operate economic entities for the purpose of self-support. It may sell religious objects, religious art and legally published religious literature on the premises of the place for religious activities.

No organization or individual is allowed to sell illegal religious publications or illegally imported religious publications. Distribution of religious leaflets or religious publications that have not been approved by the relevant department of the people’s government is prohibited everywhere.

Article 25

Property and revenues of places of religious activities shall be managed and utilized by the democratic management team of the said places; other organizations or individuals may not appropriate or transfer them for their own use without proper compensation.

Article 26

Religious organizations are mass organizations representing the legal rights and interests of the clergy and citizen religious believers. A religious organization must be examined and approved by the religious affairs bureau of a people’s government above the county level. It must then be approved by and registered with a civil administration organ at the same level. Only then can it begin its activities. Those religious organizations that are qualified may obtain the status of legal persons.

A religious organization is under the supervision of a religious affairs bureau of a people’s government. It organizes religious activities and performs religious functions according to law. No organization or individual may interfere with it.

Article 27 (new)

Religious organizations enjoy the following rights:

(1) protection of the rights and interests of citizen believers, the clergy and the places for religious activities, guidance and supervision of the operation of the places for religious activities;

(2) confirmation and supervision of clergy and other personnel;

(3) enjoyment of the ownership and the right to use their buildings and other property according to law; independently dispose of their economic income;

(4) management of economic entities for self-support.

Article 28 (new)

A religious organization must perform the following duties:

(1) abide by the laws and statutes of the state, accept control and supervision by the religious affairs bureaus and other relevant departments of people’s governments at various levels;

(2) propagate and carry out the policy of freedom of religious belief;

(3) reflect the aspirations and demands of citizen believers;

(4) educate citizen believers in patriotism, law-abiding and living in harmony;

(5) engage in training activities to enhance the capabilities of the clergy;

(6) assist the religious affairs bureaus of people’s governments in successfully managing religious affairs;

(7) guide citizen believers to participate in building socialist modernization.

Article 29

Religious organizations, on the basis of equality and mutual respect, and with the approval of the State Council or equivalent governing body of the autonomous regions, may conduct friendly exchanges with foreign religious organizations and clerics.

Article 30

The acceptance of donations by religious organizations, places for religious activities and religious personages from foreign religious organizations or individuals is regulated by the relevant statutes of the state.

Article 31

Those religious organizations in the autonomous region wishing to publish, reprint or issue scriptures or classics, or to publish interpretations of classics, religious doctrines, or cannons, should complete the formalities for permission in accordance with the relevant stipulations of the state and the autonomous region. No organization or individual may publish, print, reprint or issue religious publications without permission.

Article 32 (new)

Bringing in religious publications or other religious objects from abroad is regulated by the relevant rules of the state and the autonomous region.

Religious publications containing substance that endangers the state security of the People’s Republic of China or the public interest of society may not be brought into the country.

Religious publications or other religious objects illegally carried into the country from abroad discovered by public security, frontier defense or customs must be documented and handed over to the religious affairs bureau of the local people’s government for investigation and disposal.

Article 33

Those places for religious activities or religious organizations that violate these regulations are to be handled by the religious affairs bureau of the people’s government above the county level according to the degree of seriousness of the offense. Criticism and education, warning, order to make amends, cancellation of registration or confiscation of illegal earnings may be meted out respectively. Cases that are especially serious are reported to people’s government above the county level, and the offender may be banned according to law.

Clergy who violate these regulations and refuse to accept education and advice are to be handled by the religious affairs bureau of the people’s government above the county level. They may receive a warning, be relieved of their religious duties, or fined between 200 and 2,000 yuan.

Article 34

Violations of the present regulations, infringements of the legal rights and interests of religious organizations, religious personnel and places of religious activities, must be referred by the People’s Government Religious Affairs Bureau at the district level or above to the relevant department of the people’s government at the same level to be investigated according to law.

Article 35

Those who violate these regulations and engage in actions that violate security administration or foreigner entry-exit regulations are to be punished by the public security organ according to law. Those who use religion to engage in activities that endanger national security should be punished by the national security or public security organs according to law. Those who engage in activities that constitute a crime will be called to criminal account by a judicial organ according to law.

Article 36 (new)

Personnel of government organs, who in the course of managing religious affairs, are found to have neglected their duty, abused power, or engaged in malpractice for personal gain shall be administratively punished within his unit or by the department overseeing said unit; where the misconduct constitutes a criminal offense, the offender shall bear criminal liability.

Article 37 (new)

Law-enforcement officers from religious affairs bureaus of the people’s government must show their credentials when performing their official duties. The relevant executive department must not punish the same violation twice for the same reason. Those who violate these regulations and are given administrative penalty must be issued a copy of the administrative penalty decision. In cases of fines and confiscations, bills printed by the finance department of the autonomous region must be issued, and the money turned over to the treasury according to stipulated procedures.

Article 38

The party concerned who refuses to accept the punishment, may file for review by the people’s government at the same level as the organ that made the decision, or by the organ one grade superior to it. The reviewing organ must make a review decision within sixty days of receiving the petition. The party that refuses to accept the review decision may file a suit with the people’s court within fifteen days of receiving the review decision. If no review petition is filed within the time limit, no suit is filed and no action is taken to discharge the obligations, the organ that made the decision may ask the people’s court to enforce its decision.

Article 39

The people’s government of the autonomous region may develop implementing measures in accordance with the above regulations.

Article 40

These regulations will come into force beginning October 1, 1994. The “Provisional Rules Governing the Management of Places for Religious Activities in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region” and the “Provisional Rules Governing the Administration of the Clergy in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region,” adopted by the 96th session of the Standing Committee of the People’s Government on August 23, 1990, are both hereby abrogated.

These regulations will come into force on the day they are published. The “Regulations on Religious Affairs of the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region” shall be amended according to this amendment and republished.

Appendix II: Interim Provisions on Disciplinary Punishments for Party Members and Organs that Violate Political Discipline in Fighting Separatism and Safeguarding Unity (2000)

Editor’s note: The following is the full text of the 2000 Interim Provisions on Disciplinary Punishments,” promulgated by the Discipline Inspection Commission of the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region Chinese Communist Party Committee on December 14, 2000. The 2000 Interim Provisions provide a wide range of sanctions against Party members involved in religious activities. 

Discipline Inspection Commission of the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region Chinese Communist Party Committee on December 14, 2000

Interim Provisions for Party Disciplinary Actions Against Communist Party Members and Party Organizations Involved in Violations of Political Discipline in the Struggle Opposing National Separatism and Safeguarding the Unification of the Motherland.

Article 1

In accordance with the Constitution of the Communist Party of China, Regulations of the Communist Party of China on Disciplinary Measures (proposed), as well as relevant stipulations, and in the light of the violations of political discipline committed by Communist Party members and Party organizations in the struggle opposing national separatism and safeguarding the unification of the motherland as well as in other related aspects, these interim provisions are formulated to strictly enforce the Party’s political discipline, safeguard the unification of the motherland and national unity, and step up the struggle against national separatism.

Article 2

Persons who have been sentenced to imprisonment according to the law or have been ordered to receive reeducation through labor according to the law for planning, organizing, participating in, supporting, or conniving at national separatist activities and for of engaging in illegal activities under the cover of religion shall be expelled from the Party without exception.

Article 3

Disciplinary action shall be taken in any one of the following circumstances against persons who participate in national separatist activities or themselves engage in illegal activities under the cover of religion.

(1) Persons who plan and organize national separatist activities or themselves engage in illegal activities under the cover of religion shall be expelled from the Party.

(2) Among persons who participate in national separatist activities and engage in illegal activities under the cover of religion, core members shall be expelled from the Party. As regards other participants, those involved in cases of a less serious nature shall be given a grave disciplinary warning or be dismissed from their posts within the Party; those involved in cases of a very serious nature shall be placed on probation within the Party or be expelled from the Party.

(3) With regard to persons who are ignorant of the facts and have participated in national separatist activities or have engaged in illegal activities under the cover of religion under duress, those who have repented and mended their ways upon criticism and education shall be given no disciplinary punishment or shall be exempt from disciplinary punishment; those who refuse to mend their ways shall be given a disciplinary warning or a grave disciplinary warning.

Article 4

Disciplinary actions shall be taken in one of the following circumstances against persons who connive at, support, or harbor national separatist activities and illegal activities conducted under the cover of religion, as well as national separatists and other criminals engaged in illegal activities under the cover of religion:

(1) Persons who give shelter to national separatists and criminals engaged in illegal activities under the cover of religion shall be dismissed from their posts within the Party or be placed on probation within the Party; and among them, those involved in cases of a very serious nature shall be expelled from the Party.

(2) With regard to persons who provide financial and material assistance or venues for national separatist activities and illegal activities conducted under the cover of religion, and with regard to persons who provide other means to support national separatist activities and illegal activities conducted under the cover of religion, those involved in cases of a less serious nature shall be given a disciplinary warning or a grave disciplinary warning; while those involved in cases of a very serious nature shall be expelled from the Party.

(3) Persons who fail to check or fail to report to higher authorities national separatist activities and illegal activities conducted under the cover of religion shall be given a disciplinary warning or a grave disciplinary punishment; and among them, those involved in cases of a very serious nature shall be dismissed from their posts within the party or be placed on probation within the Party.

(4) With regard to persons who connive at and harbor a situation wherein Party members, Party and government functionaries, and current teachers and students in areas and units under their jurisdiction are engaged in religious services that will interrupt the order of their work, teaching, and studies, such as religious services, scriptures studies, and Ramadan, those who have repented and mended their ways upon criticism and education shall be given no disciplinary punishment or be exempted from disciplinary punishment. Persons who refuse to mend their ways upon education shall be given a disciplinary warning; and among them, those involved in cases of a relatively serious nature shall be given a grave disciplinary warning or be dismissed from their posts within the Party, while those involved in cases of a very serious nature shall be placed on probation within the Party.

Article 5

In the struggle of opposing national separatism and safeguarding the unification of the motherland, persons who deliberately absolve national separatists and criminals engaged in illegal activities under the cover of religion of their guilt, tip the latter off, or stall for time in order to obstruct the case-handling process shall be dismissed from their posts within the Party or be placed on probation within the Party; and among them, those involved in cases of a very serious nature shall be expelled from the Party.

Article 6

In the struggle of opposing national separatism and safeguarding the unification of the motherland, persons who quail before dangers and run away when going into battle shall be given a grave disciplinary warning or be dismissed from their posts within the Party; and among them, those involved in cases of a very serious nature shall be placed on probation within the Party or be expelled from the Party.

Article 7

With regard to persons who decide or participate in the printing, reproduction, compilation, publication, or issuance of propaganda materials on religious subjects in violation of relevant stipulations, and with regard to persons who organize or participate in the printing, writing, posting, and distribution of slogans, articles, books, and audio and visual products containing contents that impair the unification of the motherland and national unity, those who are held directly responsible shall be given a grave disciplinary warning or be dismissed from their posts within the Party; and among them, those involved in cases of a very serious nature shall be placed on probation within the Party or be expelled from the Party. Persons who should assume responsibility as leaders shall be given a disciplinary warning or a grave disciplinary warning; and among them, those involved in cases of a very serious nature shall be dismissed from their posts within the Party or be placed on probation within the Party.

Article 8

Persons who stick to the stand of national separatism and openly publish articles, speeches, declarations, and statements that endanger the unification of the motherland and national unity shall be expelled from the Party. Persons who openly publish or spread remarks that will impair the unification of the motherland and national unity shall be given a disciplinary warning or a grave disciplinary warning; and among them, those involved in cases of a very serious nature shall be dismissed from their posts within the Party, be placed on probation within the Party, or be expelled from the Party. Persons who have repented and mended their ways upon education shall be dealt with leniently.

Article 9

With regard to persons who listen to (or watch) and spread reactionary religious audio and visual products as well as reactionary religious printed materials, those involved in cases of a less serious nature shall be given a disciplinary warning or a grave disciplinary warning; those involved in cases of a relatively serious nature shall be dismissed from their posts within the party or be placed on probation within the Party; while those involved in cases of a very serious nature shall be expelled from the Party. Persons who have repented and mended their ways upon criticism and education shall be dealt with leniently.

Article 10

With regard to persons who establish contacts with overseas (external) religious organizations and provide financial aid for exchange activities with overseas (external) religious organizations without authorization, who accept donations earmarked for religious affairs from overseas (external) religious organizations and religious personnel without authorization, and who go on an overseas (external) pilgrimages without authorization, those involved in cases of a less serious nature shall be given a disciplinary warning or a grave disciplinary warning; those involved in cases of a relatively serious nature shall be dismissed from their posts within the Party or be placed on probation within the Party; while those involved in cases of a very serious nature shall be expelled from the Party.

Article 11

With regard to persons who give approval to the construction of religious sites or gain such approvals by fraud in violation of relevant stipulations, those involved in cases of a less serious nature shall be given a disciplinary warning or a grave disciplinary warning; those involved in cases of a relatively serious nature shall be dismissed from their posts within the Party or be placed on probation within the Party; and among them, those involved in cases of a very serious nature shall be expelled from the Party.

Article 12

With regard to persons who send their children and families to private schools or private classes for scripture studies, those who refuse to mend their ways upon education shall be given a disciplinary warning or a grave disciplinary warning; and among them, those involved in cases of a serious nature shall be dismissed from their posts within the Party or be placed on probation within the Party.

Article 13

Under circumstances when leading cadres fail to stop, by oversight, the functionaries working beside them, as well as their own spouses and children, from participating in national separatist activities and illegal activities conducted under the cover of religion and that such failure has led to serious adverse influences, the leading cadres involved shall be given a disciplinary warning or a grave disciplinary warning; and among them, those involved in cases of a very serious nature shall be dismissed from their posts within the Party.

Article 14

In the face of major events in the struggle of opposing national separatism and safeguarding the unification of the motherland, persons who fail to show a clear-cut stand or fail to take the initiative to coordinate relevant authorities in the settlement of problems, and persons whose attitude of going against the decisions and measures of Party organizations has led to adverse influences, shall be given a disciplinary warning or a grave disciplinary warning; and among them, those involved in cases of a very serious nature shall be dismissed from their posts within the Party.

Article 15

Under circumstances that policies and work plans of both the central authorities and the autonomous regional authorities for opposing national separatism, safeguarding the unification of the motherland and national unity, and maintaining social stability are not correctly or effectively enforced and that problems have thus arisen in areas under their jurisdiction, principal leaders who are found responsible shall be given a disciplinary warning; and among them, those involved in cases of a relatively serious nature shall be given a grave disciplinary warning or be dismissed from their posts within the Party; those involved in cases of a very serious nature shall be placed on probation or be expelled from the Party. As regards key leaders who are found responsible, those involved in cases of a relatively serious nature shall be given a disciplinary warning or a grave disciplinary warning, while those involved in cases of a very serious nature shall be dismissed from their posts within the Party.

Article 16

In the struggle of opposing national separatism and safeguarding the unification of the motherland, under the circumstances that leaders fail to promptly discover problems in their own units or departments, such as a rampant spread of political liberalism and failure to act in unison with the central authorities, or that leaders have shut their eyes to the problems, allowed the problems to spread unchecked, and even shielded and connived with the problems instead of handling the problems seriously as soon as they are discovered, principal leaders who are found responsible shall be given a disciplinary warning or a grave disciplinary warning if they are involved in cases of a relatively serious nature, while those involved in cases of a very serious nature shall be dismissed from their posts within the Party. As regards key leaders who are found responsible, those involved in cases of a very serious nature shall be given a disciplinary warning or a grave disciplinary warning.

Article 17

Corresponding organizational actions can be taken, when necessary and in accordance with established procedures, against persons who are given a disciplinary warning or a grave disciplinary warning because of violations of the stipulations laid out in articles 3-16 under these provisions.

Article 18

Persons who have a strong religious belief and are eager to organize and participate in religious activities and who have refused to mend their ways despite repeated education ought to be persuaded to withdraw from the Party or be removed from the Party. Persons who have become professional religious personnel shall be removed from the Party without exception.

Article 19

In the struggle of opposing national separatism and safeguarding the unification of the motherland, under circumstances that Party committees fail to correctly implement the Party’s line, principles, policies, and work plans and that such failure has led to serious consequences, the Party committees that are found responsible shall be reorganized or disbanded.

Article 20

Corresponding political disciplinary measures can be taken against violators of the stipulations laid out above who hold political disciplinary liabilities, by reference to the party disciplinary punishments they have already been subjected to.

Article 21

These provisions shall be interpreted by the Discipline Inspection Commission of the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Regional Chinese Communist Party Committee.

Article 22

These provisions shall go into effect on the day of their promulgation.

Appendix III: Regulations on the Specific Scope of State Secrets in Religious and Ethnic affairs (1995)

Editor’s note: The following is the full text of two regulations detailing what type of religious and ethnic information must be classified as state secrets or restricted to internal circulation. One regulation was jointly promulgated in 1995 by the State Secrets Protection Bureau and the State Council Ethnic Affairs Commission. The other regulation was promulgated at the same time by State Secrets Protection Bureau and the State Administration of Religious Affairs. The two regulations ban unauthorized disclosure of information regarding almost any national minority or religious matter or policy, even if unrelated to national security.

Regulations on the Specific Scope of State Secrets and Classification of Religion Work

(Promulgated by the State Administration of Religious Affairs and the State Secrets Protection Bureau, October 12, 1995)

Article 1

These regulations are enacted in accordance with the “PRC Law on the Protection of State Secrets” and the “Implementation Measures of the PRC Law on the Protection of State Secrets.”

Article 2

State secrets in the domain of religion work designate matters that affect the security and interests of the state, and that are entrusted to a limited number of people for a given period of time through a specified legal procedure.

Article 3

Specific scope of state secrets and other secrets matters concerning religion.

I. Top secret matters

1. measures and countermeasures taken to handle sudden public order incidents which have religious aspects;

2. countermeasures under consideration regarding the use of religion to carry out political infiltration and engage in serious illegal criminal activities;

3. guiding principles and strategies under consideration regarding major problems involving religious aspects with respect to foreign affairs or foreign nationals.

II. Highly confidential matters

1. major guiding principles and strategies under consideration for analyzing the situation and development of religion;

2. specific guiding principles and tactics for those who associate with overseas and Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan religious organizations.

III. Secret matters

1. important problems reflected in the implementation of relevant religious policies;

2. internally-held lines of action towards external propaganda work.

Article 4

The following religion work matters are not categorized as state secrets, but are matters to be managed internally, and may not be disseminated without approval from the organ:

1. information and drafted suggestions for arrangements for important representatives of religious groups;

2. analyses and reflections on information on religious individuals that have an important influence abroad, in Hong Kong, Macao, and Taiwan;

3. reports and records of talks with received representatives of religious groups;

4. opinions and recommendations of representatives of religious groups towards the country’s drafted guiding principles, policies, and reflections on important policy decisions in the field of religion;

5. analyses of developments with overseas religious organizations and their personnel;

6. information and statistical figures not suitable for the public relating to overseas religious organizations, religious institutions, and religious activities;

7. information relating to Party cadres and Party grassroots organizations in religious bodies;

8. draft laws and regulations on religion;

9. contents of meetings of organs not suitable for the public.

Article 5

The scope of state secrets protection of ethnic work that involves state secrets matters and other secrets matters from other state organs is ascertained by the leading organ involved.

Article 6

The interpretation of these regulations rests with the State Administration of Religious Affairs.

Article 7

These regulations are effective December 1, 1995. The 1991 “Regulations on the Specific Scope of State Secrets and Classification of Religion Work” issued by the State Administration of Religious Affairs and the State Secrets Protection Bureau (State Administration of Religious Affairs promulgation No. 296 (1991) will cease to be effective at the same time.

Regulations on the Specific Scope of State Secrets and Classification of Ethnic Work

(Promulgated by the State Ethnic Affairs Commission and the State Secrets Protection Bureau, March 17, 1995)

Article 1

These regulations are enacted in accordance with the “PRC Law on the Protection of State Secrets” and the “Implementation Measures of the PRC law on the Protection of State Secrets” in order to protect the security and interests of the state and foster the development of ethnic work.

Article 2

State secrets in the domain of ethnic work designate matters that affect the security and interests of the state, and that are entrusted to a limited number of people for a given period of time through a specified legal procedure.

Article 3

The specific scope of state secrets and other secrets matters in religion work is as follows:

I. Top secret matters

1. analyses of situations and important developments that can seriously damage ethnic relations and factors that have ethnic aspects that can endanger national unity and influence social order;

2. measures and countermeasures taken to handle sudden public order incidents which have ethnic aspects;

3. measures and countermeasures adopted against ethnic separatist movements.

II. Highly confidential matters

1. important guiding principles, policies and measures in formulating current preliminary informal discussions of relevant ethnic work;

2. plans and measures for handling ethnic disputes;

3. important issues in ethnic work reflected in relevant ethnic problems and policies of ethnic minorities in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macao, and residing overseas.

III. Secret matters

1. important issues reflected in the implementation of relevant ethnic policies;

2. information and measures under consideration that must be held internally on the work of ethnic identification and the establishment of ethnic autonomous areas;

3. internally-held lines of action towards external ethnic propaganda work and ethnic foreign affairs work;

4. analyses of important developments in ethnic languages.

Article 4

The following ethnic work matters are not categorized as state secrets, but are matters to be managed internally, and may not be disseminated without approval from the organ:

1. content of organ meetings that are not suitable for the public;

2. state organs’ internal work plans, summaries, submissions, reports and relevant materials;

3. statistical materials and formulations of guiding principles and policies in departmental work, within a fixed time and scope, that is not suitable for the public;

4. documents, data, publications and bulletins on state organs’ internal consultations.

Article 5

The scope of state secrets protection of ethnic work that involves state secrets matters and other secrets matters from other state organs is ascertained by the leading organ involved.

Article 6

The interpretation of these regulations rests with the State Ethnic Affairs Commission.

Article 7

These regulations are effective from the date of promulgation. The “Regulations on the Specific Scope of State Secrets and Classification of Ethnic Work,” issued by the State Ethnic Affairs Commission and the State Secrets Protection Bureau on April 2, 1992 will cease to be effective at the same time.

Appendix IV: Manual for Urumqi Municipality Ethnic Religious Work (excerpts)

Editor’s note: The following document contains excerpts from the Urumqi Manual, edited by the Urumqi Ethnic Religious Work Committee (June 2000). The book is described in the afterword as a handbook “to be used to conduct education and serve cadres whose work entails ethnic religious affairs.” It is structured as responses to 146 different questions, ranging from Party doctrinal topics (“What are the four fundamental principles and guiding principles on religious work set forth by Comrade Jiang Zemin?”) to specific issues that religious affairs cadres have to deal with (“What qualifications must religious personnel possess?”), and government policies (“What measures has the Urumqi Municipality Committee taken in the recent years to protect social stability?”).

Question 62: What places for religious activities should not be granted registration?

In any of the following cases, registration should not be granted:

1) places that do not meet any of the conditions for registration;

2) places that superstitious sects and secret societies that have been outlawed attempt to revive in the name of religion;

3) places of reunion such as temples, churches, and mosques that have been set up without approval by false religious figures or non-religious disciples (people who have not been baptized or ordained);

4) places of religious activities set up in the mainland by foreign religious organizations or foreign religious clerics;

5) places of religious activities whose management teams, finances or religious education activities are manipulated or controlled by foreign forces;

6) the “Regulations on the Management of Places of Religious Activities” have been violated, or there have been severe violations of the law through criminal activities;

7) the local population of believers has no need [for a place of religious activities], there are no [local] clerics, or the place is used by a few people to attract visitors or to carry out superstitious activities.

 

Question 79: What are the national regulations on publishing material affecting Islamic religion?

The State has concrete regulations regarding the publication of material affecting Islamic religion. It is necessary to obtain the examination and approval of the Religious Affairs Bureau at the provincial level of the people’s government and to report to the corresponding government level of the News Publishing Department. This kind of material can only be distributed and circulated within government-approved mosques. If the volume is high, examination and authorization by the national Religious Affairs Bureau and a permit from the News Publishing Bureau are required. Non-religious groups and individuals, without exception, are not authorized to print and publish. Those who violate the above regulations are to be dealt with according to illegal publishing activities regulations.

Any item to be published (including news and articles) related to research and appraisal of Islamic religion must uphold the Marxist viewpoint on religion, and use the yardstick of the Party's and the government's religious policies and regulations... For any sensitive question, if it discuses the implementation of religious policies or foreign policies and touches upon the questions of national minorities’ religious beliefs, taboos, customs and so on, the publishing unit must report to the management department at the next higher level to seek approval. It is imperative to seek the views of the provincial level and national level Islamic Association or the Religious Affairs Bureau in a timely manner.

Commercial presses that do not have a “publishing unit” state license should never, without exception, accept commissions for any kind of publication related to Islamic religion…Distribution units should not distribute books, magazines, journals or musical material of a religious nature from non-official publishing units.

Question No. 87: What are illegal religious activities? What are their main forms?

The category of illegal religious activity includes any religious activity that violates the country’s constitution, laws and regulations or the autonomous region’s management of religious affairs regulations, dispositions or rules.

The main forms of illegality are:

1) compelling people to believe;

2) compelling people to participate in religious activities;

3) privately organizing religious study schools;

4) using religion to meddle in administration, justice and education, weddings, family planning or cultural activities；

5) without having obtained authorization, engaging in religious activities spanning different localities or organizing other religious activities;

6) beautifying, revamping or enlarging places for religious activities without having obtained authorization;

7) restoring abolished religious feudal privileges and oppressive exploitative systems;

8) printing religious propaganda material without authorization;

9) receiving foreign contributions from religious organizations and individuals without authorization;

10) going abroad to study religion or carrying out religious activities in conjunction with foreign religious organizations without authorization;

11) privately setting up a religious “spot” and conducting proselytism without registration and authorization;

12) slandering the authorities, plotting to murder patriotic religious figures, fighting against the leading authorities of religious places and organizations, premeditatedly evading supervision, and stirring up trouble;

13) engaging in religious infiltration, setting up religious organizations, conducting proselytism and so on by hostile enemy forces;

14) advocating “holy war,” inciting religious fanaticism, developing religious extremist forces, spreading rumors, distorting history, advocating separatism, opposing the Party and the socialist system, sabotaging social stability or the unity of nationalities, inciting the masses to illegally rally and demonstrate, attacking the organs of the Party, government, army or public security;

15) using religion to breed separatist elements and reactionary backbone elements or to establish reactionary organizations; to carry out other activities that are harmful to the good order of society, production and life, and to criminal activities;

16) spreading evil cults.

Question 90: What are the “four protections” that must be implemented in order to do good religious work?

It is necessary to carry out protection of the people’s interests, protection of law and order, protection of ethnic unity, and protection of national unity.

Question 131: What measures has the UrumqiMunicipality Committee taken in the recent years to protect social stability?

For three consecutive years since 1997, under the unified arrangement of the autonomous region, Urumqi municipality’s seven districts and one township, in particular Liudaowan, Bagang, Yamalike Shan, dispatched “rectification of public order” work teams; and cleaned out and struck at hardcore separatist elements, leading elements of religious extremist forces and violent terrorist criminal movements, obtaining important results and, therefore, protecting the smooth development of all activities in Urumqi municipality.

Appendix V: Letter from the Xinjiang School of Forestry Student Office (1999)

Editor’s note: The following is the full text of a letter from the authorities of the Xinjiang School of Forestry to a number of Uighur students’ families to warn them that unless their children stopped their involvement in religious activities they would be expelled from the school. The letter refers to a policy document (Document No. 5 from the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region Education Commission) that prohibits students from “praying, keeping fast and other religious activities.” The Xinjiang School of Forestry is part of the Xinjiang Agricultural University in Urumqi.

Xinjiang School of Forestry Student Office

Family leader: How are you?

In order that your children will develop in all areas, concentrating fully on their studies so as to become able and talented people of an outstanding century, we advise you of the following:

Some students who are studying in our school, namely your children, have not been concentrating fully on their studies as they have been praying and keeping the fast and becoming involved in some religious activities, thus disobeying Document No. 5 1996 of the Autonomous Region Education Commission which says that students should not participate in religious activities (praying, keeping the fast and other religious activities) and also disobeying our school rules.

So we ask that during the holiday, you educate your children further so as to help them to complete their studies at our school successfully.

If this behavior is seen again, the students will be expelled.

Xinjiang School of Forestry Student Office

15.7.1999

[stamp of office]

Appendix VI: Chinese official promises “devastating blows without showing any mercy” to Xinjiang separatists

Editor’s note: The following is the text of a speech by Xinjiang Party Secretary Wang Lequan at a session of the Chinese People’s Consultative Conference on January 14, 2003, as reported in an article from the official China News Agency. In his speech, Wang Lequan promises to “hit proactively” and deal “devastating blows without showing any mercy” to ethnic separatists. Wang also urges combating separatism “on the ideological front” and in the religious sphere. 

Urumqi, 14 January [2003]:

Wang Lequan, member of the CCP [Chinese Communist Party] Central Committee Political Bureau and secretary of the CCP Committee of the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region, said at a session of the Xinjiang Region Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference Committee held here in Urumqi that Xinjiang will always keep up the intensity of its crackdown on ethnic separatist forces and deal them devastating blows without showing any mercy.

Wang Lequan said: There is a conception at present that the current top priority for Xinjiang is to develop itself successfully and that as Xinjiang’s economy develops and the people’s living standard improves the issue of maintaining stability in Xinjiang can be resolved automatically. This is a very confused and very dangerous conception. Xinjiang’s economic development cannot eliminate the ethnic separatist forces. Nor can it make the ethnic separatist forces give up their desire to practice splittism and obtain independence.

Wang Lequan said: Xinjiang will crack down on the ethnic separatist forces by “treating both the symptom and the root cause.” We shall consistently adhere to the principle of “hitting out proactively and striking them as soon as they appear” in tackling separatists, such as the “three forces” [terrorist, separatists, and extremist forces], and deal them devastating blows without showing any mercy. In the ideological field, we shall carry on with education in patriotism and nationality solidarity; firmly refute all the fallacies of ethnic separatism that distort the history of Xinjiang, including the history of how the nationalities developed and how their religion evolved; and lay a solid ideological foundation and mass foundation for maintaining stability in Xinjiang.

Wang Lequan said: Xinjiang will continue to consolidate the patriotic united front with the religious community, give play to the positive strength of religious personalities in promoting Xinjiang’s social development and stability, and steadfastly crack down on religious extremist forces. Meanwhile, it will make the people of Xinjiang more capable of resisting the separatists’ infiltration under the cover of religion and firmly safeguard well the overall situation of stability and development in Xinjiang.

Source: “Wang Lequan: Xinjiang will deal devastating blows to ethnic separatist forces,” China News Agency, January 14, 2003 [王乐泉：将给与民族分裂势力以毁灭性打击， 中国新闻社，2003年1月14日]

Acknowledgements

This report was edited by Brad Adams, executive director for the Asia Division of Human Rights Watch; Mickey Spiegel, Senior Researcher; and Joe Saunders, deputy program director. Dinah PoKempner, general counsel for Human Rights Watch provided legal review. Jo-Anne Prud’homme, associate for the Asia division, provided administrative and technical assistance. Production assistance was provided by Andrea Holley, manager of outreach and public education; Fitzroy Hepkins, mail manager; Veronica Matushaj, photo editor; Elijah Zarwan, web editor; and Jagdish Parikh, online communications content coordinator.

Human Rights Watch would like to thank many in the Uighur community in Xinjiang and in several countries for their contributions to the report. Many, themselves victims or witnesses to human rights abuses, risked danger to themselves and their families by sharing their knowledge and experiences with us. Human Rights Watch also wishes to thank Sidney Jones, Robert Barnett and Zama Coursen-Neff, and the staff of Human Rights in China, for their contributions to the report.

Human Rights Watch

Asia Division

Human Rights Watch is dedicated to protecting the human rights of people around the world.

We stand with victims and activists to bring offenders to justice, to prevent discrimination, to uphold political freedom and to protect people from inhumane conduct in wartime.

We investigate and expose human rights violations and hold abusers accountable.

We challenge governments and those holding power to end abusive practices and respect international human rights law.

We enlist the public and the international community to support the cause of human rights for all.

The staff includes Kenneth Roth, executive director; Carroll Bogert, associate director; Michele Alexander, development director; Peggy Hicks, global advocacy director; Barbara Guglielmo, finance director; Lotte Leicht, Brussels office director; Steve Crawshaw, London office director; Maria Pignataro Nielsen, human resources director; Iain Levine, program director; Wilder Tayler, legal and policy director; and Joanna Weschler, United Nations representative. Jane Olson is the chair of the board. Robert L. Bernstein is the founding chair.

Its Asia division was established in 1985 to monitor and promote the observance of internationally recognized human rights in Asia. Brad Adams is executive director; Veena Siddharth is advocacy director; Saman Zia-Zarifi is deputy director; Sara Colm and Mickey Spiegel are senior researchers; Meg Davis, Meenakshi Ganguly, Ali Hasan, Charmain Mohamed, John Sifton, and Tejshree Thapa are researchers; Jo-Anne Prud’homme and Fatima Ayub are associates. Joanne Leedom-Ackerman is chairperson of the advisory committee.

Web Site Address: http://www.hrw.org

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Human Rights in China

The mission of Human Rights in China (HRIC) is to promote universally  recognized human rights and advance the institutional protection of  these rights in the People’s Republic of China (China). As a Chinese NGO with extensive networks inside China, HRIC contributes uniquely to  human rights work in China by implementing programs to generate institutional, systemic change in China while also engaging in  critical advocacy strategies on behalf of individuals in China. We  seek to enlarge the independent civil space within China by engaging a broad cross-section of citizens and activists inside and  outside China.

HRIC’s approach is guided and informed by four key objectives:

– Promoting a growing rights consciousness and reaffirming the dignity of the Chinese people.

– Supporting the development of civil society and empowering peaceful grassroots activism.

– Acting as a catalyst for social change towards a more open, just, and democratic China.

– Advocating effective implementation or revision of China’s domestic laws and practices in compliance with international human rights obligations.

In pursuit of these objectives, HRIC engages in interrelated education, research, and international, domestic, and electronic advocacy projects.

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I. Summary¹

In recent years, China’s government has lifted some of its tight restrictions on the country’s long-dormant civil society. Senior Chinese officials have shown a growing awareness about the need to mobilize civil society in order to combat a range of social problems, ranging from humanitarian relief to education and legal defense. As a result, many nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), grass-roots groups, and non-profit websites have sprung up around the country.

But the Chinese state remains deeply ambivalent about these groups, as it does of any institution that is outside of direct state control. Continuing restrictions on civil society, free expression and free association, along with a general lack of accountability for government officials, have hindered the growth of grass-roots groups. Local activists and NGOs are also hampered by the Chinese government's sporadic harassment and detention of activists whose public criticism threatens the interest of some segments of the government. Even as NGO activity generally increases, activists and NGO staff continue to report constant state surveillance, a web of bureaucratic obstacles, and even open harassment in the course of doing their daily work.

The Chinese government seems to have become noticeably more tolerant of nongovernmental activity in the fields of environmental protection and HIV/AIDS. In the latter case, Chinese authorities, who confront a rapidly-escalating AIDS epidemic, seem to be drawing on experience with the AIDS epidemic in many other countries, which has shown that a key ingredient of any successful plan to fight AIDS is the active participation of a vibrant civil society. AIDS tends to strike hardest at those most marginalized by mainstream society: the poor, injection drug users, men who have sex with men, and sex workers. Grassroots activists and NGOs are often best placed to reach persons on the margins of society and to provide them with urgently-needed information and services, whether in person or on the Internet. NGOs can also assist with monitoring how well large-scale government programs are implemented—or not—on the ground. Their experience in living with and combating the epidemic on the front lines can strengthen AIDS policy and law.

While Chinese AIDS activists are playing a leading role in the country’s small but emerging independent nongovernmental organization sector, they continue to face institutional obstacles and, in some regions, severe harassment. This report documents such obstacles and traces their consequences for the battle against HIV/AIDS in China.

Testimonies of activists and experts gathered by Human Rights Watch show continuing human rights concerns in four areas:

• Detention and harassment by local authorities in Henan province of AIDS activists who help orphans, speak to the media, or demand access to antiretroviral treatment;
• Harassment of activists working with persons at high risk of HIV transmission, such as injection drug users and sex workers, who are themselves at risk of arbitrary detention;
• Censorship of websites that provide AIDS information to men who have sex with men; and
• A restrictive and outdated set of regulations that create at times imposing obstacles for new AIDS organizations seeking to register or work independently.

These practices have hamstrung China’s ability to mobilize citizens to respond to the AIDS epidemic. More broadly, the case material presented here illustrates how continuing obstacles to freedom of association and expression are limiting the development of a civil society that can address emerging social problems. We also provide concrete recommendations about removing particular barriers at various levels of the Chinese bureaucracy that continue to hamper the literally vital work of Chinese AIDS activists.

[1] This report focuses on AIDS activists and civil society groups, not on obstacles faced by all people involved in addressing the HIV/AIDS epidemic in China. Human Rights Watch has addressed some of the broader problems in detail in its 2003 report, “Locked Doors: The Human Rights of People Living with HIV/AIDS in China,”available at http://www.hrw.org/reports/2003/china0803/.

II. Case Study: The Closure of Orchid Orphanage

The violent closure of the Orchid Orphanage in Henan exemplifies many of the problems discussed in this report:

• the absence in China of the kind of vibrant, multifaceted NGO sector urgently needed to assist and effectively mobilize communities devastated by the AIDS epidemic,
• the failure of some authorities to work with AIDS NGOs that do exist,
• obstacles to the registration of new groups,
• the excessive use of force by rural police and officials against those who protest or otherwise challenge government policies, and
• discriminatory government treatment of people with HIV/AIDS.

In 2003, AIDS activist Li Dan established a small non-profit orphanage in an abandoned temple building in Shangqiu city. He named the school “Eastern Treasure” [dongzhen东珍], which Li Dan said referred to the children; the orphanage was known as the Orchid Orphanage in English. At the time of its closure, the Orchid housed twenty-two children from Henan’s Shuangmiao village between the ages of seven and fourteen, including both orphans and children whose HIV-positive parents were too unwell to care for them.² The school was staffed with four paid teachers and several dozen young volunteers.

Li Dan, himself a member of the Communist Party, tried to register the school formally in October 2003, but ran into a series of difficulties with local officials, some of whom told Li Dan they did not want the facility in the town because it hurt the region’s image and economy.³ At one stage, officials urged Li Dan to turn funds he had raised for the school over to the government and allow them to run it.⁴ Later, officials demanded he pay a registration fee of 1 million yuan [about U.S. $120,000]; when Li Dan found donors willing to come to Shuangmiao village to pay the fee, police forcibly closed the school, and tried to persuade the donors to donate their money to the local education bureau instead.⁵  

Like many other would-be NGOs, Li Dan eventually succeeded in registering the school as a commercial enterprise instead of as an NGO. But conflicts with local officials continued, culminating in the school’s closure by force in July 2004. ⁶

On July 9, 2004, local officials called orphanage staff and told them that the government was closing the orphanage immediately, and would forcibly remove the children to a government facility on that same day.⁷ After some negotiation, staff of the orphanage reached an understanding with local officials that they would leave on the following day. But later that same evening, police and officials attempted to forcibly close the orphanage. An eyewitness reported to Human Rights Watch what happened:

At about nine o’clock in the evening, the government sent a lot of people to surround the building. There were more than a hundred people from the government around the building, most of them…cops. The officials were from the government of the city of Shangqiu and the government of the town of Zhecheng…All the people from the government were divided into more than twenty teams.⁸

Without any [discussion with] the parents…the government said to the children… “Your parents are waiting for you in the cars.” They also promised the children, “If you go with us, you can live in [a] hotel and go to school to [continue] learning.” Refused by the children, they [attempted] to force the children into the cars. [Staff] were forbidden to speak and leave the room.

The children felt very scared and broke down and wept. Badly shaken, one of the children fell into a faint. One volunteer, trying to protect the children, was pulled into a car by some insolent [government] people….

The children that were not taken to the cars were very frighten[ed] and ran to the second floor. More than ten officials, coming into the yard, shouted, “There are some children upstairs. Let’s take them away.” Then a lot of officials rushed onto the second floor. Then the sound of the children’s crying, and the officials’ shouting came from the second floor.⁹

Family members of the children, hearing what was happening, rushed to the school and began threatening officials and police officers, who withdrew, reportedly fearing HIV infection.¹⁰ That evening, fearing a worse conflict the following day, Orchid staff closed the orphanage and sent the children to stay with relatives in their home village.

As discussed in more detail in this report, fallout continued after the closure of the orphanage. In the wake of the closure, several orphanage staff prepared to raise the issue with national-level ministries and Chinese media. Three were detained for a month, during which time those who were HIV-positive were refused access to their previous course of antiretroviral medications and suffered a decline in health. After the three orphanage staff were released, Li Dan and several other AIDS activists who had raised concerns about these detentions were detained in turn, and report that later they were beaten by thugs who warned them to stop making trouble.

[2] Tan Ee Lyn, “China shuts school for AIDS orphans – activist,” Reuters, July 12, 2004.

[3] Philip P. Pan, “China’s orphans feel brunt of power,” Washington Post, September 14, 2004.

[4] Pan, “China’s orphans feel brunt of power.”

[5] Tan, “China shuts school”; Bian Cheng, “A Graduate Student and Children Orphaned by AIDS,” Chinese Society for Human Rights [online], www.humanrights.cn/zt/magazine/200402004921163841.htm (retrieved May 20, 2005); “Defenders of the Right to Health: Li Dan,” Amnesty International, [online] http://asiapacific.amnesty.org/apro/aproweb.nsf/pages/LiDan (retrieved May 20, 2005).

[6] Chen Ying, “Just a misunderstanding? Private school for AIDS orphans is shut down by the local government,” Beijing Today, March 26, 2004.

[7] Tan, “China shuts school.”

[8] According to another account, the officials and police officers were not in uniform and did not show proof of their identities. E-mail message from Wang, Chinese AIDS activist, to Human Rights Watch, 2005. To protect their security, all names of those interviewed in China have been changed, and details of the dates and locations of the interviews have been omitted.

[9] E-mail message from Zeng, former Dongzhen volunteer to Human Rights Watch, July 14, 2004.

[10] E-mail message from Zeng to Human Rights Watch, July 14, 2004. Another account of the Orchid crackdown by an orphanage volunteer confirmed most of these details and also reported that four of the police officers were armed. Posted July 15, 2004, www.chinaaidsorphans.org/wangguofeng.asp#topic1.

III. Introduction

China faces what could become the largest AIDS epidemic in the world. Official estimates say that 840,000 Chinese men, women and children are now living with HIV/AIDS.¹¹ However, the actual numbers are almost certainly much higher: estimates by some international experts have ranged in the millions.¹² International and official Chinese experts all say that China will likely have ten million people living with HIV/AIDS by the year 2010.¹³

In the past two years, senior Chinese officials have begun to confront the grave threat posed to China by the AIDS epidemic and have taken steps to combat it. These steps have included the establishment of a high-level State Council AIDS Working Committee, headed by Vice-premier and Minister of Health Wu Yi, and the launching of an ambitious nationwide treatment and care program.¹⁴ The “Four Free and One Care” policy promises to:

• Provide free antiretroviral drugs to persons with HIV/AIDS in rural areas and impoverished persons in urban areas;
• Provide free voluntary counseling and HIV testing;
• Provide free antiretroviral drugs to pregnant women, in order to prevent mother-to-child transmission;
• Provide free schooling to children orphaned by AIDS; and
• Offer care and economic assistance to persons living with HIV/AIDS and their families.¹⁵

In addition, some Chinese ministries have initiated new policies to inform people about HIV/AIDS and to promote the use of condoms.¹⁶ In August 2004, China amended its national law on prevention and control of infectious diseases to explicitly prohibit discrimination against people with HIV/AIDS.¹⁷ In addition, though injection drug users are still subject to arbitrary detention, China has also begun to expand more progressive methadone treatment programs. In 2004, China’s premier Wen Jiabao called fighting the AIDS epidemic China’s top priority.¹⁸ After many years of government denial about the epidemic, these are significant steps forward that represent real progress.

Senior Chinese officials have shown a growing awareness about the need to mobilize civil society in order to combat a range of social problems, including environmental degradation and AIDS.¹⁹ In response, China’s NGO sector, virtually nonexistent a decade ago, has been allowed to emerge. But as this report shows, the Chinese state remains deeply ambivalent about NGOs. China’s continuing restrictions on civil society, free expression and free association; the general lack of accountability for government officials; and the state’s sporadic harassment and detention of activists whose public criticism threatens the interest of some segments of the government; all combine to severely constrain the growth of a civil society that can effectively join the fight against AIDS.

There are three broad political and social trends driving the current situation: tensions between growing tolerance of NGO activism by senior officials and the more repressive views of local officials; the growing gap between coastal cities and inland rural regions; and the state’s harassment, censorship and detention of those most vulnerable to HIV/AIDS.

First, calls for tolerance of NGOs by senior officials exist in continual tension with the Chinese government’s chronic institutional discomfort with any initiative not sponsored by the state. This discomfort leads state actors to place numerous obstacles in the path to development of independent nongovernmental organizations and websites.

In the past two years, senior national officials have shown concern about AIDS and tolerance of AIDS activism: China’s premier, Wen Jiabao, and the vice premier and director of the Ministry of Health, Wu Yi, together visited people living with HIV/AIDS in Beijing’s Ditan hospital on World AIDS Day in December 2003; afterward, Minister Wu Yi had a private meeting with internationally-renowned Henan AIDS doctor and activist Gao Yaojie.²⁰ Minister Wu has also made public statements underscoring the importance of creating an environment that will facilitate mobilizing civil society.²¹ Chinese AIDS activists report that they feel they now have more space to work than they had even a year or two ago. This was evident at the Fifteenth International AIDS Conference in Bangkok in July 2004, where the Chinese government’s team of official spokespeople was matched, and sometimes overmatched, by an outspoken group of twenty grassroots NGO representatives.

However, signals of tolerance by Beijing are contradicted in practice by the state’s frequent repression of free expression and association rights, and by highly restrictive regulations, written in an earlier era, that continue to constrain the work of grassroots organizations. Statements by senior officials are also frequently in clear tension with the actions of the local officials charged with actually implementing AIDS policies, some of whom see grass-roots activism as a threat to their political control. As UNAIDS and the State Council itself jointly acknowledge, “the core challenge remains that of achieving the effective implementation of these policies at the local level.”²² While statements by senior officials have offered hope and encouragement to many frontline AIDS activists, they have done little to loosen the bonds in which many do their day-to-day work.

A second continuing problem is that some of the tension between local and central government authorities arises from the growing economic gulf between China’s coastal cities and inland towns and villages. China’s cities are developing with lightning speed, especially in coastal areas, while inland provinces and rural areas continue to struggle economically. Most of the new AIDS groups are in more developed and consequently more open cities, such as Shanghai and Beijing. But China’s AIDS epidemic is not predominantly an urban one; it mostly affects the rural poor and injection drug users and sex workers in underdeveloped inland regions such as Yunnan, Inner Mongolia, and Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region.

The greatest need for social mobilization is in those areas, but those are also areas with the greatest political restraint. AIDS activists in the inland provinces face almost insurmountable difficulties in registering, fundraising, and in relations with the media. In rural areas in particular, the old Chinese saying, tiangao diyuan (“Heaven is high, and the emperor is far away”) often continues to be operative: activists report that national policies on AIDS are unevenly implemented, thanks to entrenched local officials who may have a limited understanding of AIDS and how it is transmitted, who see HIV/AIDS as a sign of moral corruption as well as a health disaster, and who see any public discussion of AIDS as a source of embarrassment that threatens external investment in their impoverished regions.

In some rural areas, public criticism of government authority is treated as a direct political challenge that must be quickly and firmly suppressed; some inland activists have even fled to avoid arrest. This problem is most acute in Henan province, one of the epicenters of the epidemic, and a province with a long and brutal track record of repressing AIDS activism. Henan’s vocal AIDS activists and the province’s proximity to Beijing have ensured it national and international attention more than other, quieter—and perhaps more successfully repressive—provinces.

The third reason why AIDS organizations and activists face ongoing problems in China has to do with the social marginalization of the people they work with. Those most vulnerable to HIV transmission, namely injection drug users, sex workers, and men who have sex with men, suffer from profound stigma, and in the case of drug users and sex workers, from draconian laws that promote arbitrary detention by police without trial. As a result, activists who work with those persons face a range of risks and hurdles. Government moral rhetoric about the importance of building a “socialist spiritual civilization,” a rhetoric that implicitly blames both Western corruption and persons most vulnerable to HIV for selfish personal “choices” that spread the virus in society, has only further marginalized and stigmatized people who most need government information and support. Official crackdowns on drug users and sex workers and censorship of frank on-line discussions of sex between men who have sex with men, have all closed the space for sharing information and mobilizing marginalized communities, and have limited the activities of activists who aim to inform them.

In response, many activists who work on AIDS, while they report greater freedom than before, continue to live in an atmosphere fraught with anxiety.²³ They engage in constant checking of the political barometer, debating each other and questioning themselves about how far they can go without triggering a government crackdown. Some AIDS activists interviewed by Human Rights Watch reported that they have developed strategies to manage the political risk that surrounds their emerging field. “We haven’t encountered any restrictions on our work,” said the founder of a new group that provides AIDS information to sex workers. “However, we just got started. We just keep it a little quiet, a little underground – we don’t do anything too loudly.”²⁴

Others report that they have learned to engage in self-censorship on certain topics. For instance, many Chinese AIDS activists report harassment by police, but are reluctant to have Human Rights Watch publish this information, even anonymously, for fear of reprisals. As one activist explained,

You can criticize the central government, but it’s different if you offend the local authorities, or some local interest group within the central government. Then you will be in very specific trouble…I am conservative when it comes to talking about the police.²⁵

Other first-hand accounts provided to Human Rights Watch reveal harassment of AIDS training workshops and detention of individual activists, harassment and detention of marginalized population groups that are most at risk of contracting HIV, and general bureaucratic restrictions on the activity of civil society and websites that curtail the ability of those at risk of HIV transmission to share vital information.

In 1996, the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCHR) and UNAIDS issued the HIV/AIDS and Human Rights International Guidelines, explicitly recognizing the contribution of NGOs toward combating AIDS, and recommending that states ensure, through political and financial support, that community consultation occurs in all phases of HIV/AIDS policy design, program implementation and evaluation, and that community organizations are enabled to carry out their activities, including in the field of ethics, law and human rights, effectively.²⁶

The Chinese government does work with UNAIDS and the UNHCHR. UNAIDS has an office in Beijing and cooperated with senior-level Chinese officials on its 2004 assessment of the AIDS epidemic. In 2000, China signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the UNHCHR in which both parties agreed to undertake a technical assistance program which included workshops on the punishment of minor crimes, human rights education, and China’s police.²⁷

The U.N. Guidelines are not binding law, but China is bound to uphold the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), which commits China to the progressive realization of the right to health. Interpreting the right to health, the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights calls the right to health:

An inclusive right extending not only to timely and appropriate health care but also to the underlying determinants of health, such as…access to health-related education and information, including on sexual and reproductive health. A further important aspect is the participation of the population in all health-related decision-making at the community, national and international levels.²⁸

The Chinese government has taken a few steps forward in enlisting the help of an emerging civil society in the fight against AIDS, but as this report concludes, there is much yet that needs to be done, and international agencies working on AIDS in China should assist in the effort. As a member of the Information Clearinghouse for Chinese Gays and Lesbians observed,

The government should recognize that grass-roots organizations can be its “right hand” and can be its partners. It should recognize that NGOs are “nongovernmental organizations,” not “anti-government organizations.”²⁹

Methodology

Human Rights Watch conducted field research for this report in mainland China for a month in 2004. A Human Rights Watch researcher interviewed representatives of about a dozen NGOs and grass-roots organizations. Additional interviews were conducted via electronic mail and telephone. Information was also gathered from published reports, published Chinese laws, policies and regulations, academic articles, news reports, and library archives.

The scope of this study is necessarily limited by the constraints imposed on human rights research in China. China is increasingly open to international NGOs working on AIDS, but it remains closed to international human rights NGOs. Chinese activists, lawyers and scholars who speak to or have contact with international human rights groups risk government retaliation. Chinese scholars and activists who travel abroad are often questioned by police on their return.

Human Rights Watch took precautions to protect the identities of witnesses and colleagues who assisted with or spoke to researchers for this report. Interviews were conducted in settings that were as private as possible. All interviews were conducted in Mandarin. In addition, the names of all interviewees have been changed in this report. Identifying characteristics of interviewees have been omitted or altered, as have precise dates and locations of field research. Human Rights Watch looks forward to the day when international human rights groups can work openly with all our colleagues in China.

Because of the security concerns, Human Rights Watch researchers did not request interviews with government officials while in China, but did write to Chinese government representatives in China and in Washington, D.C., to request interviews, but received no response.

[11] State Council Working Committee on HIV/AIDS and U.N. Theme Group on AIDS in China: A Joint Assessment of HIV/AIDS Prevention, Treatment and Care in China (2004) (Beijing, December 2004).

[12] Until 2002, China claimed that only a few thousand of its citizens were living with HIV/AIDS. In 2002, the government increased the estimate to one million. In its 2002 report, UNAIDS estimated up to 1.5 million Chinese people were living with HIV/AIDS. However, in 2003, a few months before announcing plans to offer free antiretroviral treatment, the Chinese government scaled down its estimate to only 840,000 people living with HIV/AIDS, and UNAIDS subsequently endorsed that estimate in the joint report cited above. However, international estimates have been much higher. China’s surveillance system has been criticized by many, including Chinese central authorities and the U.N. (see Joint China CDC-U.S. CDC HIV Surveillance Assessment (Beijing, China and Atlanta, U.S.A., 2002, p.1-2). Doctors and activists in Henan province still estimate that one million people may be HIV-positive in that province alone. Other international experts have expressed skepticism about China’s official numbers; some suggest there may be between six and ten million (Anthony Saich, “The Potential of the HIV/AIDS Epidemic,” from “Social Trends in China: Implications for the PLA,” in D. Finkelstein, ed., Swimming in a New Sea: Civil-Military Relations in China, forthcoming; E-mail message from Joanne Csete, executive director of Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network, to Human Rights Watch.

[13] National Intelligence Council, The Next Wave of HIV/AIDS: Nigeria, Ethiopia, Russia, India and China (Washington, D.C., September 2002) [online], http://www.cia.gov/nic/PDF_GIF_otherprod/HIVAIDS/ICA_HIVAIDS20092302.pdf (retrieved May 21, 2005); “Premier Wen spearheads crusade to dispel discrimination against AIDS victims,” People’s Daily, December 2, 2003; translated by China AIDS Info [online], http://www.china-aids.org/english/News/News261.htm (retrieved May 21, 2005).

[14] State Council and U.N. Theme Group on HIV/AIDS in China, A Joint Assessment of HIV/AIDS.

[15] State Council and UNAIDS, Joint Assessment of HIV/AIDS, p. 9. In this report, the word “children” refers to anyone under the age of eighteen. The U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child, ratified by China on April 1, 1992, defines a child as “every human being below the age of eighteen years unless, under the law applicable to the child, majority is attained earlier” (Article 1). U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child, G.A. res. 44/25, annex 44 U.N. GAOR Supp. (No. 49) at 167, U.N. Doc. A/4/49 (1989).

[16] Joint Assessment, p. ii.

[17] Joint Assessment, p. 12. However, the law does not supercede local regulations. Explicitly discriminatory local regulations remain in effect in many provinces and cities around the country, and despite the national law, some regions have continued to enact new regulations that mandate discrimination.

[18] “Fight against AIDS must be China’s top priority: PM,” Agence France-Presse, July 10, 2004.

[19] “NGOs to play important role in China's AIDS prevention, control,” Xinhua, April 13, 2004 [online], http://www.china-aids.org/english/News/News341.htm (retrieved May 21, 2005).

[20] Joint Assessment, p. 9.

[21] Joint Assessment, p. 13.

[22] Joint Assessment, p. iii.

[23] One notable exception to the rule that AIDS activists in urban areas are relatively free is that of Hu Jia, a prominent Beijing AIDS activist and former director of Aizhixing. Since 2003, Hu Jia has been repeatedly placed under house arrest, largely because of his activism on accountability for the June 4, 1989 massacre, forced evictions, and other issues. In late April 2005, Hu Jia was beaten by Beijing police and was detained for a week before being released without formal charges.

[24] Human Rights Watch interview with Hua, gay rights activist, 2004.

[25] Human Rights Watch interview with Su, Chinese AIDS activist, 2005.

[26] Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights (OHCHR) and the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS, “HIV/AIDS and Human Rights International Guidelines” (from the second international consultation on HIV/AIDS and human rights, 23-25 September 1996, Geneva), U.N. Doc. HR/PUB/98/1, Geneva, 1998, Guideline 2.

[27] OHCHR, Technical Cooperation Between the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and the People’s Republic of China: Information note (Geneva, September 2000).

[28] U.N. Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, General Comment 14, “The right to the highest attainable standard of health,” U.N. Doc. E/C.12/2000/04 (2000); Section I paragraph 11.

[29] Chen Wenjun, “Shilun Zhongguo aizibing fangzhi NGOde zhunru ji guanlide falu wenti [An exploration of legal questions in the registration and management of Chinese AIDS prevention NGOs],” published by the Information Clearinghouse for Chinese Gays and Lesbians, page 5; paper on file at Human Rights Watch.

IV. Continuing Crackdown in Henan Province

Henan province, the site of one of the world’s most disastrous and preventable HIV/AIDS catastrophes, presents all the perils and promises facing AIDS activists in China, often in extreme. Thousands of people, perhaps a million or more, were infected with HIV as a result of a profit-driven blood-selling scheme that operated throughout the 1990s.³⁰ Similar blood-selling schemes operated in a number of other provinces, and Henan’s response to the crisis in many ways exemplifies some of the worst problems caused by China’s center-local AIDS policy divide.

Local authorities, particularly those in Henan provincial and county health bureaus, were deeply involved in the blood-selling enterprise. Some local health officials enriched themselves and their family members by encouraging thousands of Henan residents, mostly impoverished villagers, to sell their blood to government health facilities. Others sold blood to “underground” or illicit blood banks. As AIDS activist Zhu Jinzhong said to a reporter,

They were all officials from the provincial Health Department or the epidemic control bureau, and their relatives and friends. Without those connections, you could not possibly set up a blood collection centre.³¹

However, the blood collection facilities were poorly run, and did not routinely test for HIV. Blood was collected and pooled, and the lucrative plasma separated out. The remaining pooled blood cells were reinjected into donors to prevent anemia and enable them to donate more often – thus quickly and efficiently spreading the AIDS virus throughout whole villages. Officials even allegedly suppressed studies that emerged while this was happening, showing the extent of the problem.³²

As a result, the populations of entire villages are now dying of AIDS, leaving behind thousands – perhaps hundreds of thousands -- of orphans. To date, no official involved in this catastrophe has been held accountable. ³³ In fact, some of the senior officials responsible for the catastrophe have even been promoted. This lack of government accountability has left in place officials who continue to impede efforts to help those affected by the disaster. Some Henan people with HIV/AIDS have called for an investigation.³⁴

While Beijing has begun to take a more forward-looking stance on the AIDS epidemic, as noted above, some local authorities continue to hamper the development of a national response, and in particular restrict and harass AIDS activists who raise concerns about their management of the epidemic. This is recognized by China’s State Council in its 2004 joint report with UNAIDS on the epidemic:

The response to AIDS by different ministries and provinces has been uneven. In many sectors and provinces, policy-makers have limited understanding of [AIDS]…and there is inadequate attention to these issues in the planning, implementation, and evaluation of HIV/AIDS policies, laws and interventions.³⁵

Henan province emblemizes these problems. Before the extent of the AIDS crisis in Henan was known, national and local officials tried to prevent the spread of information about the causes and extent of the blood scandal, often by using China’s highly restrictive “State Secrets” law, which can lead to serious criminal penalties for the dissemination of any information deemed – even retroactively – to have been a “state secret.”³⁶ In 2002, Beijing police detained Wan Yanhai, director of the Beijing-based AIDS organization Aizhi Action, on suspicion of circulating state secrets; specifically, an internal government report on the epidemic. He was released after an international outcry.³⁷ In 2003, Ma Shiwen, deputy director of Henan’s Office of Disease Control, was detained several times on suspicion of circulating state secrets, most likely for sending the report earlier circulated by Wan Yanhai. After another international outcry, Ma Shiwen too was released without charges on October 16, 2003.³⁸ In the 1990s and early 2000s, Chinese and international journalists who visited Henan to document the epidemic were often detained, interrogated, and expelled.³⁹

The massive dimensions of the AIDS crisis and Henan’s proximity to the Beijing press corps made it inevitable that the truth would emerge. As the story of this disaster became known in China and abroad, the Chinese government changed its response.

The national government, as well as Henan provincial and county officials, have now promised medical aid and financial support to impoverished villages ravaged by the AIDS epidemic. In September 2003, senior Beijing health officials promised that through the “Four Free and One Care” program, the government would provide free antiretroviral treatment to all those who could not afford it.⁴⁰ In October, China’s Ministry of Health announced that it would begin by implementing a “Comprehensive AIDS Pilot Area” project, targeting fifty-four areas in eleven provinces, including several key areas of Henan, for receipt of treatment and care. In particular, those in the pilot areas who contracted HIV through blood transfusions (and sales) were promised free treatment.⁴¹ In February 2004, seventy-six provincial officials were dispatched to the countryside to oversee implementation of the program.⁴²

Furthermore, an official statement about the policy said that “rural residents and AIDS patients [living] in cities and towns, who have never participated in health insurance, or a treatment insurance program, and who are in economic difficulties” could receive treatment and medication at designated public health facilities.⁴³ Henan authorities have added their own promises of support. A “Six Ones” policy commits the province to building:

One road, one water well, one school, one standardized clinic, one orphanage and one education room at villages hit hard by HIV/AIDS, and [to providing] housing, clothes, food, basic health care, and access to schooling for all school-aged children.⁴⁴

The Henan government further pledged to establish orphanages for children orphaned by AIDS, and to provide a small subsidy to families that adopt orphans.⁴⁵

But in practice the Henan response to the AIDS crisis continues to be uneven, and in some cases hostile to efforts by HIV-positive villagers and activists who have formed local NGOs to help provide care, treatment and emotional support to fellow families struggling with the devastating impact of the epidemic. Residents and activists continue to raise concerns about the lack of adequate facilities to meet the overwhelming needs of tens of thousands of children affected by AIDS, the poor quality of the care and treatment provided, the sometimes abusive treatment by local authorities when senior officials come to visit; and about alleged corruption in the administration of internationally and nationally-funded aid programs.

While more information about the harassment of AIDS activists has emerged from Henan than from other provinces, this does not necessarily mean that other provinces are less restrictive; rather, they are subject to less scrutiny. As an AIDS activist explained to Human Rights Watch,

In Henan, there are angry farmers and famous doctors; it is near Beijing, journalists can visit it easily, and the local government cannot cover it up. [Another province with high HIV prevalence] is different. People know little about it, there are not many activists, and it is easy for the government to act less openly. They may appear open to foreigners and AIDS organizations -- that is easy for them to do. But if you get onto the ground and see the grass roots, you will see experiences like that of [an AIDS activist who was hounded out of town by local officials].⁴⁶

Some local authorities, such as those in Yunnan and, more recently, Shanxi, have garnered praise from AIDS activists who see local officials as concerned about and responsive to the crisis.⁴⁷ In Hebei, however, journalists have recently begun to document similar attempts to cover up the state’s role in comparable blood scandals by firing a whistle-blower who spoke to media, and suing a newspaper for libel when it reported on tainted blood sales.⁴⁸ The Chinese state has acknowledged similar blood donation scandals in five other provinces.⁴⁹ In this sense, the experience of Henan is instructive.

Detention and harassment of Henan AIDS activists

Henan officials continue to detain those who publicly criticize provincial efforts, or who attempt to disseminate information about the AIDS situation, either through the media or during official visits by high-ranking Chinese and international delegations.⁵⁰ Some authorities have explained their actions by saying that AIDS activism, and even orphanages established for children affected by AIDS, make local officials look bad by drawing attention to the epidemic and discouraging external investment.

China reports that its “Four Free and One Care” program has been a success so far, with 10,388 patients receiving antiretroviral drugs in eighteen provinces and autonomous regions, including Henan.⁵¹ However, grassroots AIDS activists in Henan paint a picture of chaotic and poorly-run healthcare facilities, hampered by poor training of healthcare workers, discrimination, and corruption.

While areas that receive a higher degree of international and domestic attention get resources, such activists say, other equally hard-hit towns out of the spotlight are neglected. One AIDS activist told Human Rights Watch that many local healthcare facilities are unclean and poorly-run, that antiretroviral distribution is uncoordinated and “chaotic,” and that many nurses continue to fear physical contact of any kind with HIV-positive people. He also reports the emergence of “medicine scalpers” -- people with good personal connections at local clinics and hospitals who are reportedly getting extra supplies of medicine and re-selling them at a profit.⁵² In another case, a popular doctor implementing the new free treatment program faced repercussions: in August 2004, Henan authorities detained Zhu Longhua, a popular village doctor, for handing out “too much” medicine, an allegation that was not explained by Henan officials.⁵³ International news reports say that the domestically-manufactured drugs are poor quality, with intense side effects. Because Henan healthcare clinics are short-staffed and often closed, and workers are poorly trained, many patients are not being seen regularly by doctors, and are not being warned about possible side effects. As a result, a number have stopped taking the medication.⁵⁴

Some of these problems appear to relate to scarce resources and others to poor coordination by the healthcare system, problems that are chronic throughout China. However, Henan AIDS activists who try to publicly draw attention to these and related issues can face serious repercussions. The threat to AIDS activists is particularly high during visits to Henan by high level national and international figures. The growing numbers of detentions, and the discriminatory views of many Henan officials, are emblemized by the fact that local authorities have now established a separate prison facility specifically for detainees who are HIV-positive.⁵⁵

Recent cases include the following:

• Henan AIDS activist Zhu Longwei has been repeatedly harassed and detained by local police and officials in connection with his advocacy on treatment access and on the plight of orphans. In October 2004, after returning from a conference on AIDS orphans in Beijing, he was attacked by a local official who has reportedly beaten other AIDS activists in the past. Zhu reported that he fought back to defend himself, seriously injuring the official. Afterwards, Zhu reported the incident to local police and government officials, and met with a lawyer. The following day, a group of five police officers came to Zhu’s home and questioned him about his trip to Beijing. Fearing arrest, Zhu left Henan for several months. In January 2005, Zhu returned to his home, met with police, signed an agreement, and paid a fine of 400 yuan [about U.S. $50]. In March, police returned to his home and detained him for a few days.⁵⁶
• In a series of incidents between August and October 2004, AIDS activists and journalists report that six volunteers working with the Orchid Orphanage organization were beaten by officials and by local thugs whom local activists believe were hired by officials.⁵⁷

• In May 2004, Chinese AIDS activists contacted the U.S. ambassador to brief him on the failure of provincial authorities to adequately assist the thousands of AIDS orphans in Henan, and encouraged him to visit. After the ambassador began to plan a visit, a colleague reported that one of the activists was detained for eight days.⁵⁸
• Three men and two women, all HIV-positive, were detained in May 2004 after seeking economic aid to repair their homes that had been publicly promised to HIV-positive persons by the Henan provincial government. As noted above, Henan authorities have promised economic assistance of this kind to Henan residents with HIV/AIDS. Police sentenced the two women to fifteen days’ detention.⁵⁹

• In April 2004, police detained a group of eight HIV-positive Henan residents who had traveled to Zhengzhou, Henan’s capital, to petition for government assistance promised by the province to people with HIV/AIDS.⁶⁰
• At the same time, two HIV-positive men from another village were detained after traveling to Beijing to ask for economic aid to pay for living expenses, and were released after their village head promised to give some aid.⁶¹
• In late April 2003, Kong Anli, a Henan man with HIV/AIDS who complained to the local health department that anti-retroviral drugs distributed by the department were past their expiration dates, was detained by Henan police in advance of a rumored visit planned by Chinese premier Wen Jiabao.⁶² He and others detained for petitioning the government for aid were released after their cases were raised with Chinese authorities by international HIV/AIDS experts and activists.
• When the World Health Organization visited Henan to investigate the SARS epidemic in May 2002, local officials reportedly ordered two people with HIV/AIDS who were seen as “troublemakers” to leave the area or be taken away by police. Yang Nidan, an HIV-positive woman who along with others had previously protested lack of access to healthcare or antiretroviral treatment, was also taken away, and when she resisted, was beaten and injured by police. When Yang demanded to know what law she had violated, police officers threatened to kill her.⁶³

These detentions are not isolated events, but are part of an ongoing pattern in which officials attempt to prevent information about the Henan blood scandal from getting out to the public.

Having restricted access by journalists during the 1990s and early 2000s, Henan authorities today continue to restrict media reporting about the epidemic. Minister of Health Wu Yi has warned that local officials who continue to cover up the epidemic will face “severe punishment.”⁶⁴ However, Human Rights Watch has gathered information about several Henan AIDS activists who were detained or harassed for speaking to or working with domestic and international media. Some activists also allege censorship or overt manipulation of government-run media by other sectors of the government.

Wu told Human Rights Watch that he fled the province in order to avoid being arrested for his contacts with the media:

The government is not letting the media report about AIDS in Henan….In some areas near our village, they won’t let reporters in, so we [AIDS activists] go out and meet them, and we take them into the village ourselves. After I brought some reporters in, the government’s attitude towards me became very bad. The government wants to organize any media reporting themselves.

The reporters get to the next village, and we organize people for them to interview. Then the Henan government puts pressure on them and the reports don’t come out. From July up to now, you won’t find a single news report on our village….If the media report on our village, they are supposed to leave out the name of the village [by agreement with local officials]….In August [2004], CCTV [China’s official television station] went to Henan, they interviewed people, and when the reporter went back to Beijing, they were not allowed to air it. The reporter felt very bad, but he said there was huge pressure, just no way to do it.

In August [2004], one time, I helped to bring in a group of over ten reporters. I let them in [the village], I took them around, and the government was extremely unhappy. After the media left, they found ways, they found excuses – this is their method.

Then they were about to detain me. I heard this from some of my relatives in the village. So I came here [outside Henan]. They would have found an excuse. I have been here for two-and-a-half months. My wife is concerned about my safety here because I’m doing a lot of interviews.⁶⁵

The local authorities do not always have to rely on fear or force to stop the spread of information about their ongoing mismanagement of the AIDS crisis in Henan. In some cases, local authorities resort to overt manipulation of the media to maintain a responsive public image. AIDS activist Wu reported information he had received from other activists about official attempts to manipulate media coverage:

On November 20th [2004] or so, a bunch of people from my village went to the county government to protest, to Shangqiu city. It was really a petitioning activity. There were over fifty people, and they went to request the cost-of-living support that the government had previously promised us. [On August 17], the government officials…brought [Hong Kong and other] media to our village. They paid three people with HIV to say [to media] that they had each received 160 yuan [U.S. $19] for cost-of-living support. Those people were paid to say lies.

So we went to protest because we hadn’t gotten this cost-of-living support. I wasn’t there but I spoke to people on the phone who were. They were there for about four hours. The city officials called our county government to come and get them. They sent a lot of cars and convinced everyone to go back to their village in the cars. But we still haven’t gotten the money.⁶⁶

Each incident of harassment of AIDS activists has a chilling effect on those who attempt to assist the people of Henan. As one volunteer who witnessed the crackdown on the Orchid Orphanage reported:

The volunteers cannot protect their [own] lives….They came to Henan in order to help these AIDS orphans, but only received bad treatment from the government. After consideration, they decided to go back home.⁶⁷

Another Henan activist asked by Human Rights Watch about detentions of AIDS activists in his town, said, “They do this to us all the time.” He declined to speak further because of security concerns.

The mistreatment of activists helping AIDS orphans

According to official Chinese figures, there are one hundred thousand children orphaned by AIDS nationwide; activists working in Henan estimate there are in fact one hundred thousand children orphaned by AIDS in that province alone.⁶⁸ In an impoverished region where the epidemic is severely stigmatized, the presence of children orphaned or otherwise affected by the AIDS epidemic poses a significant challenge to local authorities.

International standards generally recommend that institutional care for children be used only as a last resort, and prominent Henan AIDS advocate Gao Yaojie has also recommended establishing a foster care system.⁶⁹ While this would be a wise long-term policy, the urgency of the current catastrophe in Henan requires swift action. Currently, widespread discrimination against people with HIV/AIDS in China, and the poverty faced by many rural Henan families, make institutions the first and virtually only solution for children whose families are unable to care for them. The tens of thousands of Henan children who have lost their parents due to complications related to AIDS, or whose parents are HIV-positive, are often turned away by local schools.⁷⁰ While the government has promised free tuition to children orphaned by AIDS, it has made no provisions for those who have lost one parent, even where that parent may have been the sole wage-earner. Schools do not uniformly implement the government’s free tuition policy, and many children affected by AIDS leave school because their families can no longer afford to pay school fees.⁷¹

The Convention on the Rights of the Child in article 20(1) provides that “a child temporarily or permanently deprived of his or her family environment, or in whose own best interests cannot be allowed to remain in that environment, shall be entitled to special protection and assistance provided by the State.”⁷² The Convention on the Rights of the Child specifically obliges states parties to take “all appropriate” measures to protect children from trafficking, being separated from parents against their will, and economic exploitation, hazardous labor, involvement in drug trafficking, sexual exploitation and abuse, and any other form of exploitation.⁷³ Regarding children orphaned by HIV/AIDS, the Committee on the Rights of the Child noted that states must provide assistance “so that, to the maximum extent possible, children can remain within existing family structures,” that where this is not possible, states should provide, “as far as possible, for family-type alternative care (e.g. foster care),” and that “any form of institutionalized care for children should only serve as a measure of last resort.”⁷⁴

China has signed and ratified the Convention on the Rights of the Child.⁷⁵ However, China’s national laws and regulations on HIV/AIDS lack clear guidelines on the care of orphans and children affected by AIDS.⁷⁶ Doctors and activists note that children affected by AIDS in China are becoming vulnerable to exactly the problems warned of by the Convention. As Gao Yaojie observes,

These orphans are plunged into such difficulties that boys enter easily into child labor while girls are vulnerable to sexual abuse. They are ripe for exploitation and need assistance…Without due care, some of them develop twisted personalities and hold grudges against everyone. If they are not placed in safe hands and given a normal education, they might end up as a threat to society.⁷⁷

While the Henan government has begun initiatives to educate children affected by AIDS, AIDS activists and doctors working in the province say that the small number of government orphanages are “overloaded” and unable to meet the need.⁷⁸

Thus, activists began several grass-roots initiatives in Henan to fill the gaps left by the state. The Henan government’s response to these efforts has been mixed at best. Some authorities encourage them, but others are resistant to any initiatives that are not government-controlled.⁷⁹ Henan authorities have sometimes dealt harshly with these activists.⁸⁰

The forcible closure of the Orchid Orphanage in July 2004 (discussed above) was one example of this harsh treatment. After the closure, activists working with the orphanage decided to travel to Beijing to petition the national health department and contact media to raise the issue. Wang Guofeng, who with his wife Li Suzhi⁸¹ had acted as the orphanage’s liaison with the government, were reluctant to abandon the orphanage. On July 11, police in Shangqiu city detained Wang Guofeng, Li Suzhi and two other AIDS activists who were all preparing to leave for Beijing, on suspicion of inciting trouble.⁸²

Wang Guofeng, who himself was HIV-positive, had already expressed fears that his local prominence and his connection with the controversial orphanage would lead soon to his arrest.⁸³ Wang and his wife Li Suzhi had long been outspoken, often sought by Chinese journalists researching AIDS in Henan, and this media work often brought them into conflict with local authorities. One Henan AIDS activist told Human Rights Watch, “The government didn’t like Wang Guofeng before [the Orchid crackdown]. Reporters were always going to see him, and that gave him ‘face.’”⁸⁴

In response to Wang and Li Suzhi’s detention, Li Dan engaged in negotiations behind the scenes with local officials, while Chinese and international organizations and experts criticized the detention and signed a petition calling for their release.⁸⁵ After nearly a month in detention, Wang Guofeng and Li Suzhi were released on August 7, but were sentenced to house arrest on charges of fraud and disrupting social order.⁸⁶ They were reportedly required to sign agreements promising not to have further contact with Orchid or with the media.⁸⁷ Four other AIDS activists detained for conflicts unrelated to the case were also released on that date.⁸⁸

However, colleagues of the six activists said that the month-long detention, combined with poor nutrition, had serious health effects on some of the HIV-positive detainees. In particular, Li Suzhi reportedly suffered some deterioration of her health because she was not allowed to continue on the course of imported antiretroviral medications she had been on until her detention, and instead was required to switch to a different and inferior course of medications produced in China.⁸⁹

Further detentions followed. Police detained Li Dan and a colleague on Sunday, August 8, 2004, as they prepared to visit Shuangmiao village to visit AIDS activists who were still in detention, and to plan a protest by people with AIDS in the village.⁹⁰ Li Dan and the other AIDS activists were all released on August 9. Li Dan reported that while waiting at a train station in Shangqiu city just hours after his release, he was attacked by two young men who told him, “You know why we are beating you.” He told a reporter, “I guess the local government is anxious about our lobbying for AIDS patients.”⁹¹ In March 2005, he reported that from August to October 2004, six members of his organization had been beaten by local officials “or villagers hired by local officials.” He added,

One of our volunteers was beaten and injured by an HIV-positive person hired by local officials, and received cuts from the beating. Now he has developed psychological issues, worrying that he has contracted the HIV virus, and developed severe depression. However, the local police have not yet started processing these assault cases.⁹²

While the closure of Orchid Orphanage case gained international attention because of the harshness of official treatment of the orphans and the orphanage staff, other orphanages run by nongovernmental groups have also faced serious official obstacles. Another emblematic case, highlighting the use of institutional barriers, occurred in early 2004, when Henan province authorities closed the Loving Care Home, a privately run not-for-profit orphanage, and appropriated the donations in order to establish a new state facility.

Like many others, Henan farmer Zhu Jinzhong contracted HIV by selling his blood at a blood collection center run by the local government. In February 2003, Zhu Jinzhong began to take care of children in his village whose parents had died of AIDS, housing and feeding over fifty of them.⁹³

In December 2003, Chinese media began to report widely on Zhu Jinzhong’s “Loving Care Home,” and nearly 1.34 million yuan [U.S. $162,000] in donations flooded in to support his work, including a donation of one million yuan from CCTV, China’s official television network. Most donations were sent to the local Zhecheng county government to be passed on to Zhu.

However, in January 2004, Zhecheng County ordered Zhu to close his orphanage and transfer the children to the Sunshine Garden Home, a county facility that was still under construction.⁹⁴ One AIDS activist involved with orphan projects in Henan raised concerns about the segregated nature of the state orphanage.⁹⁵

The new facility has refused to accept any new orphans, despite the tremendous need for assistance in Henan. According to media reports, the new facility refused to accept new orphans when other families asked for help with the care of children; director Yang Jiafeng said that he would only accept the children from Zhu Jinzhong’s orphanage because those children “came with the money.”⁹⁶

Li Dan told Chinese journalists of similar comments from officials in relation to the closure of the Orchid Orphanage:

The officials told me the local government has established the Sunshine Home orphanage so it’s unnecessary for us to find another one. But the children now staying at [our] orphanage are from Zhu Jinzhong and our school. What about other AIDS orphans?

Just before the bureau came to our school, we had decided to admit nine more students. After the orphanage took the eighteen students, we asked them to accept the nine others. But they refused.⁹⁷

A Henan official justified the closure of Zhu Jinzhong’s home to the news media by claiming that Zhu had run afoul of government regulations, and, more revealingly, by citing his HIV-positive status as evidence of his lack of fitness to care for the children:

Zhu Jinzhong did not get approval from the local government agency, and his caring for a large number of children, while admirable, is not legal. Moreover, Zhu Jinzhong himself is HIV-positive, and to let him be the caregiver for AIDS orphans is definitely not beneficial to the children’s development.⁹⁸

The official did not account for the fact that donations to Zhu’s orphanage had been not only channeled through the county government but kept by it. In fact, this practice violates China’s own national Donation Law, which stipulates that donations “should be used in a manner respecting the wishes of the donor, and conforming with the end purpose of public welfare. Donated property may not be diverted to other purposes.”⁹⁹ The law also bars government work units from seizing donations intended for public welfare organizations.¹⁰⁰

Many local activists believe that the orphanage was closed because its existence embarrassed the government by pointing out their failure to provide for local orphans, and because authorities wanted the money.

Zhu Jinzhong was unable to re-establish the orphanage. In January 2005, while traveling home from a trip to Beijing, he contracted a rapidly-progressing pulmonary infection and died at the age of thirty-seven, while still urging his family members to find a way to help the children he had cared for.

                        *                       *                       *                       *

A state-organized system of foster care, combined with strong protections against discrimination in public schools, might offer the best long-term solution for Henan orphans and children affected by AIDS. Considering the urgent need right now, however, Henan and other affected provinces can ill afford to wait, leaving thousands – perhaps hundreds of thousands – of children without adequate care or education. Beijing’s promise through its “Four Free and One Care” program to provide free education, medication, and other assistance to AIDS orphans has not been sufficient in Henan; the province does not yet have enough facilities or services for children affected by AIDS in that region. NGOs that wish to establish institutions for the care of these children should be encouraged, and should be governed by reasonable regulations that establish clear standards of care and education. The state should not discriminate against HIV-positive persons who wish to establish such facilities. In fact, people who are living with the virus themselves may be very well positioned to help children cope with the traumatic effect of the epidemic. The state’s top priority in this catastrophe, for which it still bears a heavy responsibility, should be ensuring that children have their basic needs met, not jailing those who aim to help them.

[30] Local doctors and activists estimate that at least one million people are living with HIV/AIDS in Henan, and that up to 1.5 million children are affected by AIDS (Chung To, “Social ramifications of AIDS: An update on the orphans of China’s Henan province,” public presentation at Columbia University, May 6, 2005). Based on research in 2002, Aizhixing Health Education Institute estimated there are up to two million people living with HIV/AIDS in Henan, most of them parents (Cindy Sui, Agence France-Presse, “Chinese NGO that probed village AIDS deaths evicted,” July 3, 2002).

[31] Patrick Brown, “Deadly Secret: AIDS in China,” Canadian TV report, April 7, 2004.

[32] He Aifang, Revealing the “Blood Wound” of the Spread of HIV/AIDS in HenanProvince, November 28, 2000, [online] www.usembassy-china.org.cn/english/sandt/henan-hiv.htm (retrieved February 12, 2002).

[33] Since the blood scandal, China has initiated a plan to regulate and certify blood products; see “China HIV/AIDS Containment, Prevention and Control Action Plan, 2001-2005,” [online], http://www.unchina.org/unaids/ekey16.html (retrieved May 21, 2005).

[34] “Gei woguo geji weisheng xingzheng bumende zhaohu xin [An open letter to every level of our country’s health and administrative ministries],” signed by ten people living with HIV AIDS in Henan, July 25, 2002; copy on file at Human Rights Watch.

[35] Joint Assessment, p. 25.

[36] China has an extensive system of classification of state secrets. Article 8 of China’s State Secrets Law lists seven categories of state secrets:

secret aspects of major policies,

secret matters relating to national constructions and military might,

secret matters relating to foreign policy or foreign matters,

secret matters relating to economic and social development,

scientific and technological secrets,

secrets pertaining to national security activities and criminal investigations,

and any other national secrets that should be protected.

In practice, courts generally decide retroactively to classify information as secret, so that it is possible for someone to “circulate a state secret” unknowingly.

[37] Jacky Wong, “Human Rights Groups, Gay Groups Picket Chinese Consulate in New York,” Sing Tao Daily, September 20, 2002; “PHR Letter on Behalf of Wan Yanhai,” Physicians for Human Rights, September 19, 2002; “Detained AIDS Activist Wan Yanhai Released,” Human Rights Watch press release, September 20, 2002; “Human Rights in China Statement on Dr. Wan Yanhai Release,” September 21, 2002; “CPJ Welcomes Release of Wan Yanhai,” September 20, 2002; “China Frees Prominent AIDS Activist,” Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network, September 21, 2002.

[38] “Arrested Chinese Health Official Released Without Trial,” Agence France-Presse, October 20, 2003.

[39] Human Rights Watch, “Locked Doors: The human rights of people living with HIV/AIDS in China,” A Human Rights Watch Report, vol. 15, no. 7 (C),August 2003, [online] http://www.hrw.org/reports/2003/china0803/, pages 28-33.

[40] “Vice minister vows to fight AIDS,” Xinhua, September 23, 2003.

[41] Zeng Pengyu, “220,000 already dead from AIDS in China, those infected by blood transfusions to get free treatment,”Beijing Youth Daily, October 4, 2003 [online], http://www.china-aids.org/english/News/News091.htm (retrieved May 25, 2005).

[42] “China sends officials to villages to fight AIDS,” Reuters, February 16, 2004.

[43] “Xinhua beijing: shenma shi si mian yi guanhuan? [Xinhua Background: What is ‘Four Free One Care’?],” December 1, 2004 [online], http://news.xinhuanet.com/newscenter/2004-12/01/content_2281179.htm (retrieved May 21, 2005).

[44] Joint Assessment, p. 12.

[45] “Help coming in for AIDS orphans,” China Daily, June 9, 2004 [online], www.china.org.cn (retrieved May 21, 2005).

[46] Human Rights Watch interview with Su, AIDS activist, 2004.

[47] E-mail message from Zhang, AIDS activist, to Human Rights Watch, 2005.

[48] Chan Siu-sin, “HIV whistle-blower still paying the price,” South China Morning Post, March 28, 2005; Chan Siu-sin, “Blood center sues newspaper over report it spread virus,” South China Morning Post, March 28, 2005.

[49] Country Coordinating Committee, 2003 Proposal to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, June 20, 2003, Section III, p. 13.

[50] Human Rights Watch interviews with Wu, Henan AIDS activist; Hui, Chinese AIDS activist; Ma, Henan AIDS activist, 2004.; “China: Police Violence Against HIV-Positive Protestors Escalates,” Human Rights Watch press release, July 9, 2003 [online], http://www.hrw.org/press/2003/07/china070903.htm (retrieved May 20, 2005); “China: Fear of torture or ill-treatment/medical concern,” Amnesty International Urgent Action, April 30, 2004 [online], http://web.amnesty.org/library/index/ENGASA170182004 (retrieved May 20, 2005); Human Rights Watch e-mail communications and interviews with AIDS activists, 2002-05.

[51] Joint Assessment, p. 20.

[52] E-mail message from Wu, Henan AIDS activist, to Human Rights Watch, 2005.

[53] “In brief,” South China Morning Post, August 11, 2004; “AIDS activist released in China as village doctor arrested,” Agence France-Presse, August 10, 2004.

[54] Jim Yardley, “China begins giving free HIV/AIDS drugs to the poor,” New York Times, November 8, 2003; Jim Yardley, “AIDS care in rural China now better than nothing,” New York Times, November 24, 2003.

[55] Fang Yuan, “China’s Henan sets up prison for AIDS patients,” Radio Free Asia, April 6, 2004.

[56] E-mail message from David Cowhig, China AIDS expert, to Human Rights Watch, March 27, 2005.

[57] E-mail message from Katie Krauss, director, AIDS Policy Project, to Human Rights Watch, March 5, 2005; Pan, “China’s orphans feel brunt of power.”

[58] E-mail message from Huang, 2005.

[59] E-mail message from Su, AIDS activist, 2004; “At least six AIDS sufferers arrested for seeking government help,” Agence France-presse, April 30, 2004. Human Rights Watch was only able to confirm five detentions.

[60]E-mail message from with Su, 2004.

[61] Ibid.

[62] “Fear of torture or ill-treatment/medical condition,” Amnesty International Urgent Action, April 30, 2004; E-mail message from Su, Chinese AIDS activist, to Human Rights Watch, 2004; Human Rights Watch communication with anonymous international health expert, 2004.

[63] E-mail message from Huang, Chinese AIDS activist, to Human Rights Watch, 2003; “AIDS yu SARS: Shijie weisheng zuzhi kaocha Henan aizibing cun jilu [AIDS and SARS: A record of the WHO’s investigation of a Henan AIDS village],” Chinese newsletter published by Loving Source, May 27, 2003.

[64] Jim Yardley, “China unveils plan to curb rapid AIDS spread,” New York Times, May 10, 2004.

[65] Human Rights Watch interview with Wu, Henan AIDS activist, 2004.

[66] Human Rights Watch interview with Wu, 2004.

[67] Human Rights Watch correspondence with Zeng, former volunteer with Dongzhen, July 14, 2004.

[68] Beijing Aizhixing Institute of Health Education, “Children/orphans and HIV/AIDS in China,” April 2003 [online], www.aizhi.org (retrieved May 20, 2005); Li Dan, “The situation of Chinese AIDS orphans,” [online], www.chinaaidsorphans.org/en_version/intro/intro.htm (retrieved June 21, 2003).

[69] Gao Yaojie, Yi wan feng xin: Wo suo jianwende aizibing, xingbing huanzhe shengcun xianzhuang [Ten thousand letters: What I have seen and heard about the living conditions of people with AIDS and STDs]. (Beijing: Zhongguo shehui kexue chubanshe, 2004), p. 236-7.

[70] Zhu Jing, “Li Dan: Wo suan shi xianshide lixiang zhuyizhe [Li Dan: I am a realistic idealist],” Nanfang Zhoumo, February 19, 2004; “Beijing hotels, schools turn away ‘AIDS orphans’,” Agence France-Presse, August 10, 2004; for more on broader discrimination against people with HIV/AIDS in China, see Human Rights Watch, “Locked Doors.”

[71] Li Xiaorong, “Social stigma, official indifference: The plight of children orphaned by AIDS in Henan,” paper on file at Human Rights Watch.

[72] Convention on the Rights of the Child, G.A. res. 44/25, annex, 44 U.N. GAOR Supp. (No. 49) at 167, U.N. Doc. A/44/49 (1989) entered into force September 2, 1990, art. 20.

[73] Convention on the Rights of the Child art. 9, 11, 32, 33, 34, 35. ILO Convention No. 182 Concerning the Prohibition and Immediate Action for the Elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labor (1999) defines the worst forms of child labor.

[74] Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC), General Comment 3, “HIV/AIDS and the Rights of the Child,” paras. 34-35.

[75] China signed the CRC on August 29, 1990, and ratified it on March 2, 1992.

[76] “Assisting Children Orphaned by HIV/AIDS in Rural Henan, China: A Concept Paper,” Beijing Aizhixing Institute of Health Education [online], www.aizhi.org (retrieved May 20, 2005). Regulations on the registration of private orphanages are also lacking. While some existing laws and regulations on the management of charities may be applicable, they do not clearly address the issue of private not-for-profit charities.

[77] “Focus: Seeking help for AIDS orphans,” China Daily, September 26, 2003.

[78] “Focus: Seeking help for AIDS orphans.”

[79] For instance, Xinmi district in Henan has regulations specifying that charities caring for children “can only be initiated by the government.” E-mail message from Wang, AIDS activist, to Human Rights Watch, 2005.

[80] In addition to the two cases discussed here, Taiwanese activists report the closure in 2004 of a third orphanage run by the Harmony Home Association in Henan. This case was reportedly associated with controversy about management of the Taiwan-based organization.

[81] Li is a common surname in China. Li Suzhi is no relation to Li Dan.

[82] Message posted to Dongzhen message forum, www.chinaaidsorphans.org/wangguofeng.asp#topic1, July 15, 2004. There have been conflicting media reports of the date of detention.

[83] E-mail message from Zeng, AIDS NGO volunteer, to Human Rights Watch.

[84] Human Rights Watch interview with Wu, AIDS activist, 2004. “Face” (mianzi 面子) is a Chinese term that refers to public stature.

[85] “Fear of torture or ill-treatment/medical concern,” Amnesty International Urgent Action, July 14, 2002.

[86] Josephine Ma, “Activist alleges intimidation bid,” South China Morning Post, August 10, 2004.

[87] E-mail message from Su, AIDS activist, to Human Rights Watch, August 8, 2004.

[88] E-mail message from Su to Human Rights Watch.

[89] Ibid.

[90] “China: Another AIDS activist goes missing in China,” Agence France Presse, August 9, 2004.

[91] Ma, “Activist alleges intimidation bid.”

[92] Human Rights Watch communication with Katie Krauss, director, AIDS Policy Project, March 5, 2005.

[93] Pierre Haski, “Mort [Deceased],” Liberation, January 20, 2005.

[94] Hou Mingxin and Zeng Pengyu, “Custody Conflict,” Beijing Today, February 13, 2004.

[95] Human Rights Watch interview with Zhou, AIDS activist, April 2004.

[96] Hou and Zeng, “Custody Conflict.”

[97] Chen Ying, “Just a Misunderstanding?”

[98] “Minzheng bu: ‘Guanai zhi jia’ heqing bu hefa [Government Agency: Loving Care Home is fair but not legal],” February 25, 2004 [online], www.sohu.com (retrieved May 20, 2005).

[99] People’s Republic of China Public Welfare Donation Law, passed by the tenth meeting of the Standing Committee of the Ninth National People’s Congress, June 28, 1999, to be implemented on September 1, 1999, article 5. Translation by China Development Brief, www.chinadevelopmentbrief.org.

[100] Donation Law, article 7.

V. Harassment of Activists Working with Persons at High Risk of HIV Transmission

As China rapidly develops economically, the country is beginning to confront major social problems linked to growing economic inequality, such as the growing number of rural injection drug users and the parallel growth of the sex industry. One of the challenges posed to many countries by the AIDS epidemic is that it tends to hit hardest those who are most marginalized by mainstream society. The more that injection drug users, sex workers and men who have sex with men are stigmatized and driven underground, the less likely they are to step forward for HIV testing or to be in contact with government programs that offer information, preventive services and treatment.

One key to preventing the spread of AIDS is therefore protecting the rights of those on the margins; as lesbian and gay studies scholar Zhang Beichuan observes, in the context of AIDS, “Protecting the rights of vulnerable persons is equivalent to protecting the rights of the great majority of people.”¹⁰¹ The ability of injection drug users, sex workers, and men who have sex with men to defend themselves against the epidemic depends on their having space to mobilize collectively, to share information and compare experiences, and to do so in a way that protects their confidentiality.

Chinese officials have taken some steps toward greater understanding: China removed homosexuality from the official list of psychological diseases in 2001, and has begun providing methadone treatment and needle exchange services to drug users in some provinces, with plans to expand these programs nationwide.¹⁰² At the same time, other Chinese policies take a contradictory approach, by targeting large numbers of injection drug users and sex workers for administrative detention, and censoring lesbian and gay websites as part of nationwide campaigns against Internet pornography. These policies obstruct the work of AIDS activists working in those communities.

As China confronts rapid social change, Party officials often refer to an urgently felt need to “wipe out social evils.” This moral rhetoric fuels popular fears and stigmatization of men who have sex with men, sex workers and drug users; and in turn increases the fears these persons have of police and other authorities. At times, concerns about “social evils” and the need for “socialist spiritual civilization” are linked to notions of corruption by the West. In 2002, the amended Constitution of the Communist Party of China declared itself to be:

leading the people in their efforts to build spiritual civilization as well as material and political civilizations, and to combine ruling the country by law with ruling the country by virtue….It is essential to…imbue the Party members with the lofty ideals of communism, resist corrosion by decadent capitalist and feudal ideas, and wipe out all social evils, so that our people will have lofty ideals, moral integrity, a good education and a strong sense of discipline.¹⁰³

At other times, official statements refer to “social evils” as lingering from China’s “feudal” past, and refer nostalgically to the elimination of drug use and sex work through draconian measures in the 1950s. In a 2000 government white paper on human rights, the State Council asserted that

Prostitution, drug trafficking and addiction, and gambling are social evils left over from old China…. [T]he people's government, on [the] one hand mobilized the masses to struggle against and punish drug producers, drug traffickers, and gambling rings, and on the other it did extensive publicity work so as to enhance the consciousness of the masses, and reform drug addicts and gamblers. After two to three years of efforts, these social plagues…were basically wiped out.¹⁰⁴

An internal debate appears to be underway between Chinese health officials and public security officials about the merits of harsh criminal penalties for drug users and sex workers, versus more tolerant policies that protect their rights.¹⁰⁵ Meanwhile, injection drug users and sex workers continue to suffer arbitrary detention and face stigma and harassment from officials, law enforcement agencies, and the wider society in China. Police conduct regular “sweeps” of social “undesirables,” putting both drug users and sex workers in administrative detention centers, which differ little from prisons. Police censorship of Internet sites with frank discussions of sex between men who have sex with men are also closing the few public spaces where lesbians and gay men can mobilize to share information. All these campaigns drive underground persons who are most in need of state and NGO assistance in the AIDS crisis.

In the U.N. HIV/AIDS and Human Rights International Guidelines, the U.N. explicitly warns of the problems that can arise from associating law enforcement with public health measures:

HIV prevention and care programs with coercive or punitive features result in reduced participation and increased alienation of those at risk of infection. In particular, people will not seek HIV-related counseling, testing, treatment, and support if this would mean facing discrimination, lack of confidentiality and other negative consequences. Therefore, it is evident that coercive public health measures drive away the people most in need of such services and fail to achieve their public health goals of prevention through behavioral change, care, and health support.¹⁰⁶

Activists working with injection drug users and sex workers

China is now confronting escalating problems with drug addiction and with an exploding sex industry, and these issues pose major challenges for China’s response to the AIDS epidemic. Both injection drug users and sex workers are detained for extended periods without trial, and are subject to mandatory HIV testing without their consent. The ever-present risk of detention combined with harsh police treatment of both groups has created severe obstacles for AIDS activists working with them.

Individuals infected via the blood scandal discussed above still probably form the majority of those living with HIV in China, but most were infected with HIV prior to 1996; the main HIV transmission route today appears to be via injection drug use.¹⁰⁷ According to an official estimate, in some areas of south China, HIV prevalence is reported to be between five and ten percent of sex workers, and official reports say the majority do not use condoms.¹⁰⁸ Other scholars estimate that 22 percent of Chinese sex workers are HIV positive.¹⁰⁹

In response, China has recently initiated policies that will offer methadone treatment to injection drug users and clean needle exchange programs.¹¹⁰ As Min Xiangdong, deputy director of the Yunnan Province Center for Disease Control explains:

Fighting against drug addiction should begin from the root cause, but to those who cannot give up the addiction right now, there is no harm to take a step back. What we need to do is not only replace their dirty syringes for clean ones, but also try to influence them through awareness in order to eliminate their dangerous habit.¹¹¹

At the same time, Yunnan continues to imprison injection drug users by the thousands.

In China, drug users are rounded up by local police, often as part of sweeps of “undesirables” before holidays or political meetings.¹¹² In accordance with the Methods of Forced Detoxification,¹¹³ a State Council policy that is enforced by police as if it has the force of law, local police stations can consign drug users from three to six months to a forced detoxification center, without trial. In 2002, Human Rights Watch visited a forced detoxification center and interviewed drug users who had been detained in other, smaller camps, as well as NGO staff who had visited similar facilities.¹¹⁴ Human Rights Watch research found that such camps are militarized, with “re-education” consisting largely of rote repetition of slogans, marching in formation, and repetitive drills such as doing squats while shouting off numbers. Interviewees described conditions of poor sanitation, poor and inadequate food and drinking water, and serious overcrowding. Human Rights Watch observed inmates forced to work without pay. For former detainees, the overriding message is one of marginalization from mainstream society and distrust of those in authority. As a result, injection drug users and sex workers seek to minimize any interaction with government authorities, or any organized gathering, that could subject them to “reeducation through labor.”

Sex workers face similar forms of detention. Estimates of the number of sex workers nationwide range widely, between three and six million.¹¹⁵ The sex industry is exploding in China, both in cities and in impoverished rural regions, where brothels and karaoke lounges have sprouted up along major highways and near construction sites and mines. A significant number of sex workers work through massage parlors and hair salons, which are fronts for brothels.¹¹⁶ Police also have wide latitude to sentence sex workers to administrative detention without a hearing or trial in re-education through labor camps. The broad leeway granted police in their treatment of sex workers means that police can extort confessions and bribes with impunity. In recent years, growing attention to police abuse by Chinese media has brought to light some cases of police abuse of sex workers, including cases of extorted confessions, rape and sexual abuse, and even murder.¹¹⁷

Fear of government reprisals limits the ability of civil society groups to work with drug users or sex workers.¹¹⁸ For instance, in northwest China, where over fifty percent of injection drug users are HIV-positive and the government maintains tight political control, authorities have sometimes clashed with AIDS activists who are former drug users.¹¹⁹ A doctor running an outreach program for sex workers in Guangxi told a reporter that initially few sex workers participated in the program because of fears of detention.¹²⁰ Organizers told Human Rights Watch that a series of conflicts between AIDS activists and local authorities culminated in a police raid on a workshop on AIDS and law in November 2004 that was attended by seventeen people with HIV/AIDS, including some former drug users.¹²¹ Soon after, one of the organizers heard that he was at immediate risk of arrest and fled the region.

Xu, an organizer of the workshop, had repeatedly clashed with local authorities during 2003 and 2004 because of his AIDS activism. According to a colleague, Xu publicly criticized local authorities for failing to deliver on their public promises of free antiretroviral treatment. In retaliation for this public embarrassment, authorities asked Xu to leave a provincial AIDS organization with which he had been affiliated. Xu in turn went over the heads of the provincial authorities, and appealed to a national government agency to intercede. Beijing authorities reportedly did so, inviting Xu to set up a new AIDS support group. Once affiliated with the new support group, Xu began again to be outspoken in his criticisms of local authorities to Chinese press and in international meetings. ¹²²

Because of Xu’s frankness and outspokenness, members of Xu’s new group began to fear for their safety. As a result, Xu and his colleagues convened their AIDS and law workshop in a comparatively low-profile hotel conference room instead of in an official meeting hall, and met without any official government affiliation or political approval. They invited a lawyer and a group of people with HIV/AIDS to discuss laws on intentional transmission, divorce and family law, discrimination against people with HIV/AIDS, and other issues. A person living with HIV/AIDS for nine years who volunteered with Xu’s group described what happened next:

The police came in the door and told us to put our hands on the tables. There were eight police officers. They said, “Don’t touch anything,” – we had pens to take notes, and they told us not to even pick up our pens. I said [to myself], I’m not using [drugs], so I have nothing to fear.

We all went downstairs and there was a big van, and they took us all away. At the station…they registered our names and identity numbers, addresses, phone numbers. Then we took drug tests….We were there from noon until six p.m. We had no food, no water. At six…they let us go. As a result [of the tests], they knew we were HIV positive. They did detailed records of each of us. Not one person tested positive for drugs.¹²³

After the raid, Xu heard from friends that he was at immediate risk of arrest. He fled to another province to wait until the controversy blew over.¹²⁴

The ever-present fear of police retaliation also silences activists working on behalf of sex workers. For instance, when Human Rights Watch approached several Chinese organizations representing sex workers, they said they were reluctant to discuss the issue of police mistreatment because they feared reprisals.

                        *                       *                       *                       *

Given the contentious relationship between Xu’s group and local authorities over AIDS activism, it is not clear whether police raided the workshop because they believed they would find drug users there, or in order to intimidate and undermine a group that had been a thorn in the side of local government. In either case, such raids are not wise AIDS policy. The Chinese state should not use coercion to detain drug users in forced detoxification centers in the first place, and there is no legitimate basis for conducting raids of this kind to ascertain whether or not participants are users. Moreover, conducting raids on AIDS workshops such as this one for any reason will only discourage people at risk from publicly identifying themselves and getting together to share information. Testing people at risk of HIV/AIDS without informed consent, especially given China’s lack of protections of confidentiality and widespread problems with discrimination, will also drive them underground and away from government and independent AIDS outreach programs.

A related concern for injection drug users and sex workers is testing by police and prison officials for HIV without informed consent of those tested; the lack of anonymity in China’s testing systems is especially worrying in the context of the almost total lack of protections against discrimination for people with HIV/AIDS. Non-consensual medicalprocedures violate the right to the highest attainable standard of health, enshrined in Article 12 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights.¹²⁵ In the context of conducting surveillance testing and other research on HIV/AIDS, Guideline 5 of the U.N. HIV/AIDS and Human Rights International Guidelines calls upon states to “ensure privacy and confidentiality and ethics in research involving human subjects.” Guideline 3 states that “public health legislation should ensure that HIV testing of individuals should only be performed with the specific informed consent of that individual.”¹²⁶

Restrictions on AIDS information for men who have sex with men

In China, men who have sex with men are highly vulnerable to the spread of HIV/AIDS, and Chinese behavioral studies say that a high percentage still does not use condoms.¹²⁷ The State Council and UNAIDS have called for greater outreach to Chinese men who have sex with men with HIV education and prevention programs.¹²⁸ However, social mores and legal restrictions have made it difficult to provide information about AIDS to this group. China has no laws prohibiting discrimination against or harassment of lesbians and gay men.¹²⁹ Chinese scholars and activists say that homophobia and discrimination are common.¹³⁰ Zhang Beichuan has conducted research indicating that thirty-eight percent of men who identify themselves as gay have experienced incidents of violence and verbal abuse based on their sexual orientation.¹³¹ Many men who have sex with men also do not publicly identify themselves as gay or tongzhi.¹³² According to official statistics, eighty percent of gay men are married or will marry.¹³³

Even for those who choose to identify as gay or tongzhi, meeting collectively can pose difficulties. According to one gay rights activist, Dalian gay bars have in the past been targeted by police for harassment and men coming out of them have been detained and compelled to pay fines.¹³⁴ In 2002, a group in Dalian invited over one hundred lesbian and gay rights activists to a national conference in the northern city of Dalian. Learning of the conference and calling it an “illegal assembly” because it was not hosted by a government agency or approved by one, police halted the conference and told participants to return home.¹³⁵ As Chinese scholar Zhang Beichuan says, “The [societal] exclusion of homosexuals makes it difficult for them to receive scientific information.”¹³⁶

Internet censorship

In this climate, the Internet has emerged as a critical means of disseminating AIDS information. But as a result of government regulation of pornographic materials on the Internet—which in China, by definition, include lesbian and gay websites—Chinese activists face restrictions on their efforts to publish HIV/AIDS information aimed at men who have sex with men.

Cao, the manager of one lesbian and gay website, explained the role of the Internet as a forum for disseminating AIDS information:

We support people changing their behavior [to protect against AIDS], and to do that, people need to be able to get information. Chinese tongzhi don’t have the right to free speech, and we can’t run our own media. So our site has become a publishing center for information around the country. People come to us to publish their information and they expect us to report their news. We’re really a service center -- “wei tongzhi fuwu” – “Serve the comrades” – and we do it all for free.¹³⁷ We have about thirty volunteers, and they all work out of idealism.¹³⁸

In China, the Internet is governed by a wide array of laws, regulations, and official news agency guidelines. National regulations, including the Methods for the Management of Computer Information Network International Internet Safety Protection, forbid the publication of obscene (yinhui 淫秽) or sexual (seqing 色情) information.¹³⁹ The Regulations on Management of Publishing, which have been interpreted as applying to the Internet, also prohibit publishing or “promulgating” obscene materials.¹⁴⁰ These regulations do not define obscenity, and in practice, local authorities have wide discretion in how they implement these regulations, and have broad authority to determine what may or may not be obscene.

One of the few national regulations to define the term “obscene” is the Temporary Regulations on the Establishment of Obscene and Sexual Publications, issued in 1988 and still in force. These regulations define an obscene publication as any publication whose content “arouses peoples’ sexual feelings sufficiently to result in the corruption and degeneracy of ordinary people, and that also lacks artistic or scientific value.”¹⁴¹ Under these regulations, same-sex activity is by definition obscene. Article 6 of the Temporary Regulations states that material may be considered obscene if it includes: “Perverted (淫亵性) and specific descriptions of homosexual sexual behavior or other abnormal behavior, or specific descriptions of abnormal energy, ill-treatment, or humiliating behavior.”¹⁴²

Other regulations go even farther. For instance, the Regulations on the Severe Statement on Prohibition of Obscene Publications Regulations, which exclude materials used for scientific purposes from the category of “obscenity” or pornography, nevertheless allow censorship of much information necessary for protection against AIDS. These regulations note that:

Even those publications that are not obscene, but that have prominent sexual content, and that seriously harm the physical and mental health of young people, without exception may not be published, copied, sold, rented, or hidden.¹⁴³

Lesbian and gay rights activists who spoke to Human Rights Watch cited a case in Dalian in August 2003 as a major incident that demonstrated the government’s broad authority to shut down lesbian and gay websites without warning, on the charge that they publish obscene materials and corrupt youth. Police in the city of Dalian closed a “Dalian tongzhi” website without notice after a local newspaper reported in a series of articles that members of the website were using the site to make dates for casual sex. Although China has no legal minimum age of consent for lesbian or gay relationships, the article raised fears that site users under the age of eighteen were being corrupted by adult lesbians and gay men.¹⁴⁴ The article was immediately picked up by national news media. The following day, Dalian police closed the site and initiated a criminal investigation of the site managers.¹⁴⁵

One gay rights activist reported to Human Rights Watch that in the weeks following the Dalian case, other lesbian and gay websites that included AIDS information were temporarily blocked.¹⁴⁶

On July 16, 2004, Zhou Yongkang, the head of China’s Ministry of Public Security, appeared on national television and called on every region and every ministry in the country to join in a national campaign to shut down all pornographic websites on-line “for the sake of development of the Internet.”¹⁴⁷ Eleven days later, police reported that nearly 700 “obscene” or sexual websites had been shut down.¹⁴⁸

The 2004 crackdown temporarily closed dozens of lesbian and gay websites around the country, including many that provided AIDS information. According to Cao, a manager of a lesbian and gay website:

This past July, all of the tongzhi sites were shut down. People who tried to open them were bounced to a government site that said, “This is illegal information.” This was part of the government’s big cleanup of the web, where they swept everything away. They shut down everything, very broadly.¹⁴⁹

An activist running a non-profit website whose purpose is to provide AIDS information aimed at men who have sex with men said,

We opened one site, it was shut down, and now we’re trying to get permission again. We’ve been doing AIDS and sexuality education for a long time. Our goal is to give people health information.¹⁵⁰

Zhang Beichuan reported that authorities shut down the message board on his self-run website, which provides AIDS information targeted to men who have sex with men. The message board on his site was used for exchanges about many topics, including questions about AIDS and sexually transmitted diseases, while some sex workers used the message board to advertise. As part of the nationwide crackdown on pornographic websites, authorities ordered it shut down in January 2005.¹⁵¹

Some activists told Human Rights Watch that the pervasive threat of government censorship of lesbian and gay websites and the jailing of webmasters had created a chilling effect on efforts to share HIV/AIDS information on the Internet, which naturally often includes sexually explicit information.¹⁵² Cao, whose website provides a question-and-answer column about HIV/AIDS and sexually transmitted diseases, said that China’s obscenity laws prevented her from talking frankly about HIV prevention on the website. “We changed our materials as a result of the sweep,” she said. “If you have ‘yellow’ [sexually explicit] materials, you will have trouble.”¹⁵³ She added that her website has now eliminated much of its sexual content, especially photographs and drawings, and that she now censors submissions by website users.

Chinese lesbians, gay men, and bisexuals have internationally-guaranteed rights to non-discrimination, to free expression, to free association and to information about HIV/AIDS.¹⁵⁴ China is bound by its constitution to uphold free expression, and has signed but not yet ratified the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which includes in free expression the right to “seek, receive and impart information and ideas of all kinds.”¹⁵⁵ While obscene material is not protected under international law, regulation of speech must be precise enough to avoid suppressing or inducing self-censorship of material that may be controversial, but permissible. China’s failure to define “obscenity” in a way that makes clear that sexually explicit information on HIV/AIDS directed at sexual minorities is permissible is a problem. Likewise, China’s closure of some websites without giving warnings or opportunity to identify and correct material deemed to violate the law also infringes on these rights.

China is also a state party to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, whose treaty body has interpreted the right to health to include the right to “access to health-related education and information, including on sexual and reproductive health.”¹⁵⁶ The state’s sweeping restrictions on lesbian and gay websites violate these basic rights and hamstring China’s response to the AIDS crisis.

[101] “Zhang Beichuan fangtan lu [Record of interview with Zhang Beichuan],” Southern Weekend, April 18, 2002 [online], www.southcn.com/weekend/tempdir/200204180025.htm (retrieved May 20, 2005).

[102] “Growing tolerance towards homosexuals in China,” China Daily, December 10, 2004; “Methadone clinics established to help addicts,” China Daily, November 18, 2004.

[103] Constitution of the Communist Party of China, amended and adopted at the 16^th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, November 14, 2002, Documents of the 16^th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (2002), Foreign Language Press, Beijing 2002, p. 82.

[104] “Fifty years of progress in China’s human rights,” Information Office of the State Council of the People’s Republic of China, June 2000 [online], http://www.china.org.cn/e-white/3/3.1.htm (retrieved May 20, 2005).

[105] “Drug users get the point,” Beijing Review, April 18, 2004 [online], http://www.bjreview.com.cn/200418/Forum.htm (retrieved May 20, 2005).

[106] OHCHR and UNAIDS, “HIV/AIDS and Human Rights International Guidelines,” Second International Consultation on HIV/AIDS and Human Rights, Geneva, September 23-25, 1996; New York and Geneva: 1998; “International human rights obligations and HIV/AIDS,” paragraph 74.

[107] Joint Assessment, p. 3.

[108] Joint Assessment, p. 6.

[109] Joan Kaufman, public presentation at panel, “The rising peril of HIV/AIDS in China: Sex work, human rights, and the challenges facing public policy,” Skidmore College, March 24, 2005.

[110] Joint Assessment, p. ii.

[111] “Drug users get the point.”

[112] In 2001, police reported detaining 247,000 drug users. “Police-monitored reform centers improving efficiency,” People’s Daily, March 30, 2001 [online], http://english.people.com.cn/english/200103/29/eng20010329_66359.html (retrieved May 20, 2005).

[113] State Council, Qiangzhi jiedu banfa [Methods for Forced Detoxification], January 12, 1995.

[114] Human Rights Watch, “Locked Doors,”p. 42-49.

[115] Zhao Xiaojian and Zhu Xiaochao, “AIDS looms large,” Caijing (English), April 20, 2004, retrieved at http://www.caijing.com.cn/english/2004/040420/aids.htm; “HIV/AIDS Policy Issues in China,” http://www.casy.org/policy.htm. Police reported detaining 53,000 people “involved in prostitution and pornographic activities” in 2000 (“Police-monitored reform centers improving efficiency,” People’s Daily, March 30, 2001).

[116] “Report cites China prostitution,” Associated Press, June 9, 1999.

[117] Yang Lingqing, “Xingxun bigong duoci jianwu nuyou [Coerced confession and multiple rape of girlfriend],” Beijing Qingnian Bao, February 20, 2004; “Guniang can zao feiren zhemo: Hebei ye pu ‘chunu piaochang an’ [Girl tragically encounters inhuman treatment: Hebei also exposes ‘virgin whore case’],” December 2, 2002, [online] www.sohu.com (retrieved May 20, 2005); “Guangxi Luan yi paichusuozhang yanxing bigong [Police station chief in Luan, Guangxi seriously coerced confession],” Xinhua, September 22, 2003.

[118] Human Rights Watch has documented other instances in which authorities have targeted individuals from high-risk groups who participate in AIDS outreach programs. See Human Rights Watch, “Locked Doors,” p. 30.

[119] Joint Assessment, p. 2.

[120] “Anti-AIDS campaign spotlights sex workers,” Xinhua, May 4, 2005.

[121] Human Rights Watch interview with Su, AIDS activist, 2004.

[122] Human Rights Watch interview with Su, 2004.

[123] Presentation by HIV-positive volunteer in AIDS program, Shanghai legal conference center, December 13, 2004.

[124] Human Rights Watch interview with Su, AIDS activist, 2004.

[125] CESCR, General Comment 14, para. 8.

[126] U.N. HIV/AIDS and Human Rights International Guidelines, Guidelines 3 and 5.

[127] Joint Assessment, p. 6.

[128] Joint Assessment, p. 18.

[129] In 2001, Chinese authorities removed homosexuality from the official list of psychological diseases, but it can be diagnosed as a mental illness under certain circumstances.

[130] Jia Ping, Tong (shuang) xinglian; “Tongxinglian: Qishi haishi ‘shehui zhichi’ [Homosexuals: Discrimination is still ‘socially supported’],” Chen Bao, August 6, 2004 [online], http://www.huash.com/gb/hscb/2004-08/06/content_1176253.htm (retrieved May 20, 2005).

[131] “Zhang Beichuan fangtan lu [Record of interview with Zhang Beichuan],” Southern Weekend, April 18, 2002 [online], www.southcn.com/weekend/tempdir/200204180025.htm (retrieved May 20, 2005).

[132] Tongzhi: literally “comrade”, a socialist term that had largely fallen into disuse until it was appropriated by Chinese lesbians and gay men to describe themselves.

[133] “China’s gays ‘expected’ to enter hetero marriages,” 365gay.com, January 2, 2005, [online] http://www.365gay.com/newscon05/01/010205china.htm (retrieved May 20, 2005).

[134] Human Rights Watch interview with Tong, Chinese gay rights activist, 2005.

[135] “Zheige wangzhan cengjing bei chachu duo ci [This website has already been investigated and sanctioned many times],” Dalian Xinshang Bao, August 26, 2003. This article was later picked up by China’s official Xinhua agency and circulated widely. Aizhixing Health Education Institute issued a statement stating that as the conference was to be held in a privately-owned bar, China’s laws on illegal assemblies should not have applied. “Statement about New China News Agency reports on ‘Dalian comrade net’ and gay commercial sex work [Guanyu Xinhua she baodao ‘Dalian tongzhi wang’ he tongxinglian xingjiaoyide shengming],” September 8, 2003, paper on file at Human Rights Watch.

[136] “Zhang Beichuan fangtan lu.”

[137] The speaker was making a pun: Wei renmin fuwu, or “serve the comrades,” is a Communist Party slogan.

[138] Human Rights Watch interview with Cao, website manager, 2004.

[139] Jisuanji xinxi wangluo guoji lianwang anquan baohu guanli banfa[Methods for the Management of Computer Information Network International Internet Safety Protection], ratified by the State Council on December 11, 1997, published by the Ministry of Public Security on December 30, 1997, article 5. Quoted in Jia Ping, Tong (shuang) xinglian xiangguan falu wenti zongshu [Summary of homosexual/bisexual legal questions], Beijing: Beijing Aizhixing jiankang jiaoyu yanjiusuo, April 2005; p. 40.

[140] Chuban guanli tiaoli [Regulations on the Management of Publishing], ratified by the State Council on December 12, 2002; implemented on February 1, 2002; article 26 (7). Quoted in Jia Ping, Tong (shuang) xinglian xiangguan falu wenti zongzhu.

[141] Guanyu rending yinhui ji seqing chubanwude zanxing guiding [Temporary regulations on establishing obscene and sexual publications], published in official news media, December 27, 1988; article 2. Quoted in Jia Ping, Tong (shuang) xinglian, p. 47-48.

[142] Ibid.

[143] Paragraph 2, Guanyu zhongshen yanqi yinhui chubanwude guiding [Regulations on the severe statement of prohibition of obscene publications], published by official news organs on July 5, 1988.

[144] “‘Dalian tongzhi wang’ rang jizhe xinjing [‘Dalian comrade net’ shocks reporter],” Dalian Xinshang Bao, August 25, 2004.

[145] “Zheige wangzhan cengjing bei chachu duo ci [This website has already been investigated and sanctioned many times],” Dalian Xinshang Bao, August 26, 2003.

[146] Human Rights Watch interview with Su, AIDS activist, 2004.

[147] “Zhou Yongkang: Dayichang weijiao yinhui seqing wangzhande renmin zhanzheng [Zhou Yongkang: The people’s battle to strike out and conquer obscene and sexual websites], Ministry of Public Security website, July 16, 2004, [online] http://202.100.100.169/ad/zhuanti/weijiao/news03.htm (retrieved May 20, 2005).

[148] “Quanguo dadun yinhui seqing wangzhan qude jieduan xing shengli [First phase of national crackdown on obscene and sexual websites is victorious],” Ministry of Public Security website, July 27, 2004, [online] http://202.100.100.169/ad/zhuanti/weijiao/news01.htm (retrieved May 20, 2005).

[149] Human Rights Watch interview with Cao, website manager, 2004.

[150] Human Rights Watch interview with Yu, AIDS activist, 2004.

[151] Zhang Beichuan geren shengming [Individual statement by Zhang Beichuan], January 2005, [online] http://friend.qdeol.com.cn (retrieved May 20, 2005).

[152] During this period, Xiao Wu, the manager of a lesbian and gay website in Shenzhen, “Make friends in Shenzhen,” was also arrested for having sexually explicit gay films for rent on his site, and was sentenced to a year in a re-education through labor camp. Human Rights Watch interview with Cao.

[153] Ibid.

[154] The U.N. HIV/AIDS and Human Rights International Guidelines notes,

The key human rights principles which are essential to effective State responses to HIV/AIDS are to be found in existing international instruments….Among the human rights principles relevant to HIV/AIDS are, inter alia:

The right to non-discrimination, equal protection and equality before the law;

The right to life;

The right to the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health;

The right to liberty and security of person;

The right to freedom of movement;

The right to seek and enjoy asylum;

The right to privacy;

The right to freedom of opinion and expression and the right to freely receive and impart information;

The right to freedom of association;

The right to work;

The right to marry and to found a family;

The right to equal access to education;

The right to an adequate standard of living;

The right to social security, assistance, and welfare;

The right to share in scientific advancement and its benefits;

The right to participate in public and cultural life;

The right to be free from torture and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

OHCHR and UNAIDS, “HIV/AIDS and Human Rights International Guidelines,” “International Obligations,” paragraph 80.

[155] International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), G.A. res. 2200A (XXI), 21 U.N.GAOR Supp. (No. 16) at 52, U.N. Doc. A/6316(1996), 999 U.N.T.S. 171, entered into force March 23, 1976, article 19. China signed the ICCPR in October 1998. Article 18 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties provides that signatory states are “obliged to refrain from acts which would defeat the object and purpose of a treaty.”

[156] CESCR, General Comment 14, “The right to the highest attainable standard of health,” paragraph 11.

VI. Institutional Barriers to AIDS Organizations

Recognizing the severity of the AIDS problem facing China, and of the important role that civil society groups can play combating the epidemic, some senior Chinese officials have begun to acknowledge the need for NGOs. Speaking with the World Health Organization on the occasion of the launch of a new AIDS program that planned to include NGOs, Hao Yang, a senior Ministry of Health official, pledged that the Chinese government would strengthen cooperation with NGOs, would provide financial support to them, and would begin “encouraging more NGOs to participate in AIDS prevention and control work.”¹⁵⁷ The number of NGOs has recently grown in China, and today there are over 800,000 officially registered NGOs. However, most of these are government-organized NGOs (GONGOs) that are closely tied to, if not outright controlled by, government agencies.¹⁵⁸

Myriad bureaucratic obstacles face any activist who wishes to establish a new NGO. The central government has left in place national regulations that grew out of older government efforts to control civil society, and that continue to severely limit the establishment and growth of independent NGOs. While these outmoded national regulations affect all NGOs equally, their vagueness and the broad powers awarded local governments to implement them have enabled some local authorities to prevent the establishment and growth of groups arbitrarily. Because of the continuing stigma of HIV/AIDS in China, these restrictions have inevitably hampered many AIDS groups.

In addition, because of the large role government plays in regulating NGOs, authorities retain the ability to use regulations to harass independent NGOs or to create obstacles to their growth.

NGO registration and management laws

Chinese NGOs face three key problems: a restrictive system of registration, a requirement that government agencies administer and police their daily work, and a requirement that funding be routed through government agencies, creating opportunities for corruption.

Chinese NGO registration laws continue to limit the growth and activity of local NGOs by requiring new NGOs to obtain a government sponsor before they can register.¹⁵⁹ Sponsoring agencies then submit the application to the Ministry of Civil Affairs.¹⁶⁰ However, both sponsoring agencies and the Ministry of Civil Affairs can easily refuse applications for a range of reasons, or without providing clear reasons at all.

China’s 1998 Regulations for Registration and Management of Social Organizations, which apply to many NGOs, stipulate that the registration and management agency may refuse registration to organizations for lack of adequate membership (the NGO must have more than fifty individual members or more than thirty institutional members) or lack of adequate funds (a minimum of 100,000 yuan [U.S. $12,000] is required).¹⁶¹ These provisions place NGOs in a difficult situation: because Chinese authorities widely restrict freedom of assembly, these restrictions award NGO status only to those groups which already have close enough government ties that they can mobilize large groups of people without having conflicts with the police. Many new NGOs, in particular AIDS groups, are likely to start with a few active members or staff and to develop and grow over time; some may function best if they are not mass, membership-based organizations. The unreasonably high funding requirement effectively limits NGO status to a wealthy few. The annual per capita income of farmers in China in 2004 was 1,345 yuan [U.S. $163].¹⁶² Even in Beijing, the nation’s capital, average annual per capita income in 2004 ranged only from U.S. $890 to $3,600.¹⁶³

According to the same regulations, the sponsoring agency can also refuse an NGO registration if there is another organization in the region engaged in a similar area of work.¹⁶⁴ However, the government has given no explanation of why there should only be one NGO working on an issue in any given region; in fact NGOs may well develop best where there is a community of activists who can pool their knowledge and resources and coordinate their efforts.

This system also permits local authorities to refuse to sponsor an NGO without offering any clear reason at all. Local government authorities who do not wish to see NGOs emerge can refuse an application for registration outright with only minimal explanation, or can embroil the NGO in a Catch-22, with each agency saying that their approval is conditional on the approval of other government agencies.¹⁶⁵ AIDS activists have reported that local authorities may require them to register with a local health bureau that refuses to even read their registration application. ¹⁶⁶ The administrator of a lesbian and gay website said that when they tried to register as an NGO they were refused, because “the government bureau did not want to take responsibility for us.”¹⁶⁷

Some rural AIDS activists report that registering their organization at all requires arduous lobbying of multiple government bodies at once. “I remember in 2003, when we raised the issue of registering with the county, they refused us in a word, and when we went to the city, they also refused us with one word,” says a Henan community AIDS activist; but:

Now we have applied to every related government agency for registration, and every agency has already signed off and has conducted an investigation of our qualifications. We have already been in contact with the county AIDS Prevention office, with the county health bureau, and [name deleted] village government has investigated our credentials. Now we’re going through the county personnel bureau’s investigation. Other personnel bureaus have investigated and reported to the county government, and once the county has approved [our application] they will report to the city and the province.¹⁶⁸

In addition to the burdensome registration process, NGOs must be administered, or “work under the leadership of” a government department that supervises all decisions made by the NGO, policing every aspect of its day-to-day work. Any work activities carried out without approval by the government agency place NGO leaders at risk of criminal sanctions.¹⁶⁹

This gives the government broad leeway to close down NGOs for a variety of reasons, including political reasons. In one of the best-known examples, the Ministry of Civil Affairs threatened to close down Friends of Nature, China’s first and most prominent environmental NGO, if it did not remove Wang Lixiong, a prominent critic of Chinese policy in Tibet, from its board of directors.¹⁷⁰

Government agencies can and have shut down AIDS NGOs for being too outspoken or critical of government policy – precisely the outcome warned of by the U.N. Guidelines.¹⁷¹ One of the most prominent examples is that of the Aizhi Action Project, which was based at Beijing University until government officials pressured the university to shut the group down because of advocacy on behalf of people with AIDS in Henan.¹⁷²

Because of the restrictive role stereotypically played by mothers-in-law in traditional Chinese families, many activists call this the “mother-in-law” system.¹⁷³ Again, this restriction affects all Chinese NGOs, but especially so the work of AIDS activists, one of whose chief functions is often to explicitly criticize the national Ministry of Health and local health bureaus, the very agencies that may be required to approve their daily work. As one Chinese AIDS activist put it,

When you’re preparing to choose a “mother-in-law,” you have to think first about whether or not you are likely to ever criticize that department and what they do. If you are, then you had better find another agency.¹⁷⁴

Last but not least, the “mother-in-law” system gives local officials tremendous authority – and opportunity – to misuse their control of funding for AIDS NGOs. In response to China’s AIDS crisis, and because domestic sources of funding for NGOs are scarce, international aid donors are beginning to increase their aid to Chinese NGOs that work on HIV/AIDS, and to encourage the development of new NGOs in areas of high prevalence. This is creating a flood of new funding. The European Union, U.S., British, and Australian government aid programs are some of the only sources of funding for Chinese NGOs, but funds from overseas are viewed with suspicion by some government officials as a sign of foreign interference in Chinese internal affairs.¹⁷⁵ As a result, “mother-in-laws” sometimes prevent Chinese NGOs from raising funds from international donors. Furthermore, putting NGOs under the supervision of state sponsors places corrupt government officials in positions where they can easily appropriate domestic and international funds intended for NGOs.

China continues to face widespread problems with corruption: in a recent State Council conference on the issue, Premier Wen Jiabao said the fight against corruption continues to be “an arduous task.”¹⁷⁶ The current regulations also create opportunities for official corruption: NGOs must route any funds raised through their “mother-in-law” agency or through the local government, which may appropriate some of the funds for itself. In some cases, as one Yunnan AIDS activist told Human Rights Watch, authorities keep the funds and tell the AIDS activist, “We don’t need you to manage this [AIDS work]; we’ll take care of it ourselves.”¹⁷⁷

Some AIDS activists report that local authorities simply skim off part of the funds for their own purposes.¹⁷⁸ Some international NGOs report that they are aware that this happens, but that they are reluctant to speak up about it for fear of jeopardizing their programs.¹⁷⁹ An activist with a program funded by AusAid, the Australian government aid agency, reported that local authorities kept a portion of the funds intended for cost-of-living support for people with HIV/AIDS:

We didn’t get all the promised funds from [an international aid donor]. All the funds were supposed to be used directly for people with HIV/AIDS but they were not. The funds were intended for training, for living expenses, for food in cafes, for meetings, and for private events. But as an example, if we were supposed to have fifty yuan per day for each person with HIV/AIDS, instead we got maybe thirty to forty.¹⁸⁰

An AIDS activist in Henan who has attempted to hold local authorities accountable for what his group believed was misuse of aid funds designated for medical care for people with HIV/AIDS reported getting this response from county health officials:

They say, “What has been spent is the Communist Party’s money, what does it have to do with you? If [people with HIV/AIDS] don’t get good medical care today, there’s always tomorrow, and we’re not going to give the money to you for asking for it; stop nosing into other people’s business, or we’ll take care of you – we’ll charge you with the crime of inciting social unrest,” and so on…so HIV-positive people feel furious but don’t dare to speak.¹⁸¹

NGOs are critically important sources of information when it comes to monitoring the disbursement of funds intended for humanitarian aid. UNAIDS and the State Council have acknowledged the need to improve management of financial resources.¹⁸²

Registering as a commercial enterprise

In order to circumvent the obstacles described above, growing numbers of Chinese civil society groups take advantage of a legal loophole that permits them to register as small commercial enterprises. One of the first of these was the AIDS organization Aizhixing; when closed down by the university where it was originally registered, Aizhixing registered as a commercial enterprise and continues to function as one. Others have since followed suit. “We registered as a commercial enterprise,” said the founder of a group that does outreach work with gay male sex workers. “Originally we wanted to apply as an AIDS NGO, but we got turned down.”¹⁸³

But according to one Chinese NGO, registering as a commercial enterprise, while creating a way out of the legal bind, can create its own problems:

Because of the regulation requiring that NGOs apply for a managing agency, and because many grass-roots organizations cannot find a managing agency and have no way to register and establish themselves, and moreover, because many other non-profit organizations have no way to register with government agencies, they have no choice but to register as commercial enterprises. They then must pay taxes, which seriously hampers the development of grass-roots organizations.¹⁸⁴

As this writer notes, the tax requirement is particularly onerous for small, struggling NGOs and can lead to financial difficulties if international donors, who support most of the financing for civil society AIDS groups in China, do not permit their funds to be used to pay taxes.¹⁸⁵ Registration as a for-profit enterprise also makes Chinese NGOs ineligible for international grant programs, and there are many that require aid recipients to show non-profit status.¹⁸⁶

While the commercial enterprise loophole has enabled some small NGOs to register and begin their work, it is not a long-term solution; it effectively restricts their ability to raise funds and develop capacity, and leaves them vulnerable to interference by the state.

Bureaucratic harassment

Because the state plays such an active role in the registration and management of NGOs in China, local authorities can use these regulations to harass NGOs.

On March 21, 2005, Chinese authorities issued new regulations requiring all organizations registered as commercial enterprises to report to civil affairs bureaus for review and approval. Those with the words “social science,” “research center,” or “research institute” in their names – in effect, many organizations that would have been registered as NGOs were they permitted to do so – were specifically identified, suggesting they would come under particularly close scrutiny.¹⁸⁷ Following on these orders, the Beijing Industry and Commerce Administration Management Bureau wrote to Aizhixing Health Education Institute and other NGOs and instructed them to change their name, removing words such as “Health Education” and “Institute” from their title. At the same time, Aizhixing was also informed that another company had registered with the name “Aizhixing” and that they would be required to change that, also.¹⁸⁸

Obligations under international law

Some Chinese authorities have themselves acknowledged that the current legal framework for NGO registration is out of date. As early as August 2000, the deputy director of China’s Nongovernmental Organizations Administrative Bureau publicly admitted,

The legal system is unsound….A disconnect exists between policies and regulations and the objective, practical requirements. The legal system is lagging behind and that definitely affects the smooth development of China’s NGOs.¹⁸⁹

International law and China’s own constitution obligate China to uphold the right to freedom of association. According to the ICCPR, which China has signed but not ratified, the right to freedom of association may only be restricted when “necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security or public safety, public order, the protection of public health or morals or the protection of the rights and freedoms of others…”¹⁹⁰ Any restrictions should be interpreted narrowly, and be proportionate to the reasons for them; a government should use no more restrictive means than are absolutely required. In addition, article 5 of the U.N. Human Rights Defenders Declaration states that all people have the right to assemble peacefully, to form, join or participate in NGOs, and to communicate with NGOs.¹⁹¹ While the state has the right to ensure that NGOs are honest and transparent, legal requirements should be minimal, clear, and attainable, permitting maximum flexibility for NGOs to establish themselves and perform their daily work. They should be enforced without discrimination. 

As the U.N. HIV/AIDS and Human Rights International Guidelines point out, community consultation is a critical element in designing strong AIDS policies.¹⁹² NGOs are one way to channel community opinion into policy design. They face numerous obstacles in China, however, where the rights to freedom of association and expression are frequently violated in practice.¹⁹³ While the Constitution upholds the right to freedom of association and the right to “criticize and make suggestions to any state organ or functionary,” and growing numbers of Chinese activists promote the Constitution in an effort to give it the status of law, the Constitution is not currently justifiable.¹⁹⁴ 

 

The right to freedom of association is particularly relevant to the work of civil society groups working with and on behalf of people suffering from the impact of HIV/AIDS. Reflecting experience from around the world, the experts gathered at the Second International Consultation on HIV/AIDS and Human Rights in 1996 pointed out that the basic right to freedom of association, enshrined in Article 20 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights,

[H]as been frequently denied to non-governmental organizations working in the field of human rights, AIDS service organizations, and community-based organizations…with applications for registration being refused as a result of their perceived criticism of Governments or of the focus of some of their activities, e.g. sex work.…In the context of HIV/AIDS, the freedom of assembly and association with others is essential to the formation of HIV-related advocacy, lobby and self-help groups to represent interests and meet the needs of various groups affected by HIV/AIDS, including [people living with HIV/AIDS]. Public health and an effective response to HIV/AIDS are undermined by obstructing interaction and dialogue with and among such groups, other social actors, civil society and Government. ¹⁹⁵

Under international and domestic law, and as a matter of practical impact, the Chinese government should allow HIV/AIDS activists to work without undue restrictions in order to face the country’s burgeoning public health crisis. 

As China’s own State Council and UNAIDS have jointly observed, one key challenge in China’s response to the AIDS epidemic will be “improving the environment for NGOs to operate, including the policy and legal framework.”¹⁹⁶ In place of the commercial enterprise registration loophole, China would be better served by reformed regulations on NGO registration that promote the growth of civil society. In October 2004, the vice director of the Chinese Ministry of Civil Affairs announced that it was considering revising the existing NGO structure, eliminating the requirement that NGOs be attached to government agencies.¹⁹⁷ Such moves are urgently needed and should proceed quickly.

[157] “NGOs to play important role in China’s AIDS prevention, control,” Xinhua, April 13, 2004; translated by China AIDS Info [online] www.china-aids.org.

[158] “NGO Summary,” Congressional-Executive Commission on China, [online] www.cecc.gov/pages/virtualAcad/rol/ngosumm.php (retrieved May 25, 2005).

[159] “Regulations for registration and management of social organizations,” State Council order no. 250, published September 25, 1998; translated by Zhang Yu and Nick Young, China Development Brief, www.chinadevelopmentbrief.org.

[160] “NGO Summary,” Congressional-Executive Commission on China, [online], www.cecc.gov/pages/virtualAcad/rol/ngosumm.php (retrieved May 20, 2005).

[161] “Regulations for…social organizations,” article 10.

[162] “Farmer’s per capita income up 16.1% January-June,” Embassy of the People’s Republic of China, September 20, 2004, [online] http://www.china-embassy.org/eng/gyzg/t159432.htm (retrieved May 20, 2005).

[163] “Income gap grows wider in Beijing,” China Daily, February 22, 2005 [online], http://english.sohu.com/20050222/n224372380.shtml (retrieved May 20, 2005).

[164] “Regulations for…social organizations,” article 13.

[165] Human Rights Watch interview with Hua, gay rights activist, 2005; electronic communication with Tang, Henan AIDS activist, 2005; electronic communication with Li, health rights activist, 2003.

[166] Human Rights Watch interview with Wen, HIV-positive volunteer in AIDS program, 2004; Chen Wenjun, “An exploration of legal questions,” page 6; “Dui 2004 nian guojia aizibing fangzhi shehui dongyuan xiangmude zhaozhi zhinande jidian yijian [Several suggestions invited and facilitated by participants in the 2004 national AIDS prevention community forum program],” December 22, 2004, [online] www.aizhi.net.

[167] Human Rights Watch interview with Cao, website manager, 2004.

[168] E-mail message from An, Henan AIDS activist, to Human Rights Watch, January 2005.

[169] “Regulations…social organizations,” article 35.

[170] “NGO Summary.”

[171] “Awards for Action on HIV/AIDS and Human Rights: 2002 International Recipient, Wan Yanhai,” Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network [online], http://www.aidslaw.ca/Maincontent/awards/internationalrecipient.htm (retrieved May 20, 2005).

[172] “Awards for Action.” Aizhi was subsequently registered as a commercial enterprise and re-opened.

[173] Chen Wenjun, “An exploration of legal questions,” page 4.

[174] Human Rights Watch interview with Su, AIDS activist, 2004.

[175] Chen Wenjun, “An exploration of legal questions,” page 5.

[176] “Premier Wen calls for greater efforts to curb corruption,” News Guangdong, February 28, 2005, retrieved at http://newsgd.com/news/china1/200502280008.htm. See also Transparency International, Global Corruption Report 2005 [online], http://www.globalcorruptionreport.org/download.html (retrieved May 20, 2005).

[177] Human Rights Watch, “Locked Doors,” p. 27.

[178] Human Rights Watch, “Locked Doors,” p. 27.

[179] Ibid, p. 30.

[180] Human Rights Watch interview with Wen, HIV-positive volunteer in AIDS program, 2004.

[181] E-mail message from Wu, to Human Rights Watch, 2005.

[182] Joint Assessment, p. 29.

[183] Human Rights Watch interview with Hua, gay rights activist, 2004.

[184] Chen Wenjun, “An exploration of legal questions,” page 5.

[185] Human Rights Watch communications with Su, AIDS activist, 2004.

[186] Human Rights Watch interview with Su, 2004.

[187] Qiu Xin, “China curbs civil society groups,” Asia Times, April 19, 2005.

[188] Vivien Cui, “AIDS group told to change name or close,” South China Morning Post, March 27, 2005.

[189] Guangyao Chen, “China’s nongovernmental organizations: status, government policies, and prospects for further development,” International Journal of Not-for-Profit Law, vol. 3, issue 3, March 2001.

[190] ICCPR, article 22.

[191] 9 December 1998, U.N. General Assembly, “Declaration on the Right and Responsibility of Individuals, Groups and Organs of Society to Promote and Protect Universally Recognized Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms.”

[192] “HIV/AIDS and Human Rights International Guidelines,” guideline 2.

[193] For more information, see Human Rights Watch 2005 World Report chapter on China, [online] http://hrw.org/english/docs/2005/01/13/china9809.htm. 

[194] Constitution of the People’s Republic of China, adopted December 4, 1982, english.peopledaily.com.cn.constitution/constitution.html; article 35 (freedom of association) and article 41 (right to criticize state organs).

[195] OHCHR and UNAIDS, “HIV/AIDS and Human Rights International Guidelines,” commentary on freedom of assembly and association, paragraph 117.

[196] Joint Assessment, p. iii.

[197] Amanda Cui and Adam Jung, “Possible changes on NGO registration,” Global Village of Beijing newsletter, October 2004.

VII. Conclusion

As China begins to tackle its AIDS crisis, it should learn from the experience of other countries. Some of the most effective responses to the crisis in many parts of the world have been led by people living with HIV/AIDS, and their families, friends, and partners. In countries such as Uganda, openness on the part of governments to civil society involvement in the AIDS struggle has led to diverse, vigorous and often successful anti-AIDS efforts.

China has begun to permit a small number of NGOs to provide frontline services in the AIDS epidemic, but the government still does not view NGOs as a resource from which it can draw expertise and insight into positive policies and laws to combat AIDS. Community organizations have historically been excluded from high-level policy and legal debates in China’s top-down system, although AIDS organizations and grass-roots groups formed by persons vulnerable to HIV infection are beginning to successfully call for more opportunities to share their input.¹⁹⁸ For instance, in April 2005, over eighty Chinese AIDS organizations publicly called for more input by grass-roots organizations into the Country Coordinating Mechanism, the Chinese committee that allocates funds from the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria.¹⁹⁹ Some authorities, at the local as well as the national levels, have responded positively to these moves. Authorities in Shanghai and Chengdu have at times invited input by NGOs into AIDS policy discussions.²⁰⁰ In a welcome move in November 2004, the State Council invited public comment on proposed regulations for health exams, and reportedly received 3,162 letters in response, an indication of the high degree of public interest in health policy.²⁰¹ 

Despite such positive moves, the Chinese government’s overall strategy regarding cooperation with civil society in the fight against HIV/AIDS remains muddled. As recently as April 2005, China blocked another popular website that provided information and support about HIV/AIDS to the gay community.²⁰² Again and again, the government’s lingering suspicion about the role of non-governmental groups seems to trump the public health imperative of working with civil society. This official confusion hinders the work of activists and NGOs, and thus undercuts the Chinese government’s efforts to combat the country’s AIDS epidemic.

China’s halting acceptance of the work of AIDS activists throws into even sharper focus the serious restrictions imposed on the country’s civil society. In fact, the Chinese government is more tolerant of groups working on HIV/AIDS than of non-governmental groups working in many other fields. Many activists and civil society groups in China face even greater official obstructions and harassment than that documented in this report; even worse off are groups trying to protect or preserve the rights of ethnic or religious groups.²⁰³

The Chinese government’s treatment—or harassment—of AIDS activists is thus significant not just because of its potential impact on the country’s AIDS epidemic, but also because it sheds light on the government’s tolerance for the growth of civil society in general. So far, the outlook remains uncertain. If China is to benefit from the energy and talents of its citizens, the Chinese government should stop impeding the activity of nongovernmental groups and instead embrace them as partners in making and implementing policies. The threat posed by the AIDS epidemic is only the sharpest reminder of the urgency of changing the Chinese government’s attitude toward activists and civil society groups.

[198] Chen Wenjun, “An exploration of legal questions,” page 6; “Dui 2004 nian guojia aizibing fangzhi shehui dongyuan xiangmude zhaozhi zhinande jidian yijian [Several suggestions invited and facilitated by participants in the 2004 national AIDS prevention community forum program],” December 22, 2004, [online] www.aizhi.net. 

[199] Vivien Cui, “Grass-roots groups seek more say on AIDS cash,” South China Morning Post, April 26, 2005.

[200] In drafting new regulations for the city of Shanghai in 2004, the city invited a group of international experts and some Chinese NGOs to share suggestions; and the Chengdu Gay Community Care Organization reports that they have input into public policies on AIDS prevention and care (brochure produced by Chengdu Gay Community Care Organization).

[201]Gongwuyuan luyong tixian shizhun xiugai [State Council Employee Hire Medical Inspection Criteria], Xinhua, November 16, 2004, [online] http://news.xinhuanet.com/newscenter/2004-11/16/content_2223012.htm (retrieved May 20, 2005).

[202] Cindy Sui, “China blocks popular website for homosexuals,” Agence France-Presse, May 18, 2005.

[203]  See for instance the systematic mistreatment of Muslim Uighur groups (Human Rights Watch and Human Rights in China, “Devastating Blows: Religious Repression of Uighurs in Xinjiang,” A Human Rights Watch Short Report, vol. 17, no. 2, February 2005) and Tibetan groups (Human Rights Watch, “Trials of a Tibetan Monk: The Case of Tenzin Delek,” A Human Rights Watch Short Report, vol. 16, no. 1, February, 2004).

VIII. Recommendations

To the government of the People’s Republic of China:

On civil society:

Revise national regulations to remove burdensome restrictions that limit the registration and growth of NGOs.  In particular, eliminate membership and minimum funding requirements; eliminate requirements that limit the number of NGOs working on the same issue in the same region; and eliminate requirements of supervision by a government agency of NGOs’ day-to-day work.  Allow donors to fund NGOs directly without funneling financial assistance through a local government agency.

Bring national and local laws and regulations on the Internet into compliance with China’s commitments under its own constitution and international law to respect the right to free expression and principles of non-discrimination. In particular, the eliminate any requirements that websites be registered with the government, and order the Ministry of Public Security to cease censorship and shutting down of websites providing AIDS information or websites that respond to the needs of minority communities.

Invite grassroots organizations to share their input on policy and legal reform, and to monitor implementation of programs relevant to their organizational mandates.

On HIV/AIDS policy:

Enact and enforce national legislation prohibiting discrimination against people living with HIV/AIDS and their families in health facilities, schools, places of employment, and other institutions. Protections from discrimination should include mechanisms for victims and their guardians to lodge complaints and receive rapid redress; these mechanisms should be publicly communicated.

The Ministry of Public Security should hold AIDS training programs in each province, and train police to work with provincial AIDS organizations to ensure that AIDS workshops are able to proceed without interference.  They should investigate cases where AIDS workshops have been disrupted by security forces without a legitimate law enforcement objective.

The State Council Committee on HIV/AIDS should direct provincial authorities to respect the rights of AIDS and LGBT activists to freedom of assembly and association, and provide recommendations on avoiding interference with activists’ work.

The State Council should issue a statement calling on the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Public Security and local bureaus under their direction to investigate local policies and regulations that restrict the activities and free expression of AIDS organizations and AIDS activists. 

Create regulations that allow the establishment of non-profit orphanages and care facilities for children affected by AIDS.

For the sake of the integrity and success of future AIDS prevention and control programs in Henan province, the State Council should authorize a full, independent and impartial investigation into the involvement of Henan authorities in the transmission of HIV through blood and plasma collection.  If this cannot be accomplished, the United Nations or other credible international body should be authorized to conduct such an investigation.

The investigation should also examine the Henan government detentions of AIDS activists, responses to protests by people living with AIDS, corruption in the administration of funds intended to benefit people living with AIDS in Henan, restrictions on domestic and international media, police abuse, and the state’s closure of nongovernmental AIDS orphanages.

Authorities should take appropriate action, including dismissal, against any officials determined to have been responsible or negligent in the blood scandal, or who were involved in the cover-up.

The Ministry of Education and state education bureaus should ensure that no children are excluded from school or discriminated against in school because of their or their caregivers’ HIV status. All schools should receive guidelines on preventing discrimination before it occurs and responding to individual cases, and protocols for enrolling HIV-positive children that address maintaining the confidentiality of the child’s HIV status, addressing the parents’ concerns, and accommodating any special needs the child may have. States should monitor schools’ compliance.

The Ministry of Health and state health departments, with assistance from international donors, should ensure that children living with HIV/AIDS receive all available medical care, including antiretroviral treatment, and use all possible means to remove barriers to their receiving care. In particular, they should prohibit government hospitals from discriminating against people living with HIV/AIDS, set guidelines for maintaining the confidentiality of HIV status of persons using health services, and explore ways of better regulating the private sector. They should also ensure that medical staff have the means to protect themselves from hospital-based HIV transmission, including protective clothing and post-exposure prophylaxis. In implementing the government’s antiretroviral drug program, they should ensure that services are offered in a way that maintains the confidentiality of participants’ HIV status and that the program reaches marginalized children, including street children, children in orphanages and those in other residential institutions.

The Ministry of Civil Affairs, the Ministry of Public Health, and their provincial counterparts should all require orphanages and other institutions that they license to accept qualifying children when there is space available for them.

The Ministry of Education and state education bureaus should ensure that all students, at the earliest possible level, receive age-appropriate information on preventing HIV/AIDS, keeping in mind the low numbers of children, especially girls, who enroll at the secondary level. This would be in accord with the recommendations of the 2002 U.N. General Assembly Special Session on Children. HIV/AIDS education should cover the correct and consistent use of condoms as the most effective way to prevent HIV transmission during sexual intercourse, including in long-term unions.

To the Henan provincial government and other local authorities in China:

Release all AIDS activists currently in detention for protesting or advocating for access to treatment and care. Promulgate regulations prohibiting discrimination against people living with HIV/AIDS in access to care.

Establish training programs for healthcare workers in HIV/AIDS treatment and universal precautions.

Establish training programs for public security officers in HIV/AIDS and human rights.

Cease restrictions on communication by people with HIV/AIDS with Chinese or international media.

To the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria and other international donors to HIV/AIDS programs in China:

All donors should advocate for transparency, access to information for AIDS activists and vulnerable populations.

Donors should condemn the detention of AIDS activists generally, especially when such detentions are done for the purpose of hiding those persons from donors.

Other donors should consider adopting the Global Fund’s new guideline that NGOs participating in their AIDS programs should be demonstrably organizations that legitimately represent a real community, and not be “government-organized” NGOs.

Bilateral aid agencies should set aside a pool of funding targeted to grass-roots Chinese organizations that can be applied for with a minimal application procedure.

Examine restrictions on application for funding by small commercial enterprises in China, and develop new ways to facilitate their ability to apply for funds.

Advocate for revisions of the Social Organizations Regulations to eliminate burdensome registration and management requirements.

When AIDS activists or lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender activists are detained, raise public or private concerns with Chinese colleagues and press for their release.

Assist Chinese AIDS activists in danger of arrest for their AIDS outreach work to find temporary safe haven.

To U.N. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights:

Support technical assistance programs to give provincial police extensive human rights and AIDS awareness training.

Provide training for Chinese AIDS and lesbian and gay rights NGOs on human rights monitoring and reporting.

To the U.N. Theme Group on HIV/AIDS, UNAIDS and other U.N. agencies with AIDS programs in China:

As part of regular evaluations on China’s progress in combating the AIDS epidemic, evaluate China’s compliance with the U.N. HIV/AIDS and Human Rights Guidelines.

Translate the Guidelines into Chinese, distribute them to Chinese government officials and to local NGOs in China, and make them available on the UNAIDS China website.

Press the Chinese government to uphold the Guidelines, and to engage in regular consultation with community organizations on design of AIDS policy and law.

Support the immediate passage of strong antidiscrimination legislation that protects the rights of people living with HIV/AIDS and their families.

Consider a high-level summit or strategy meeting on protecting the rights of children affected by HIV/AIDS in China.

To international partners in bilateral rights dialogues with China:

Inform Chinese and Henan officials that detention of any AIDS activists in advance of a diplomatic visit to Henan will result in a public response.

Raise the issues above with Chinese dialogue partners.

Acknowledgements

This report was researched and written by Sara (Meg) Davis, researcher in the Asia division. Saman Zarifi, Asia division deputy director; Scott Long, LGBT Rights program director; Jonathan Cohen, HIV/AIDS and Human Rights program researcher; Rebecca Schleifer, HIV/AIDS and Human Rights program researcher; Zama Coursen-Neff, Children’s Rights division researcher; Dinah PoKempner, general counsel; and Joe Saunders, deputy program director, edited the report. Jo-Anne Prud’homme, Andrea Holley, Veronica Matushaj, Fitzroy Hepkins, Jose Martinez, and Elijah Zarwan provided production assistance.

Human Rights Watch is grateful for invaluable information provided in published reports from Aizhixing Health Education Institute. Human Rights Watch also gratefully acknowledges the input and assistance of Hanni Batzel, Joanne Csete, Katie Krauss, Mickey Spiegel, Nick Su, Loretta Wong, the China AIDS Solidarity Network, and many other Chinese colleagues who must remain anonymous.

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I. Summary

Two people died already in the past year––we don’t dare say how, but they were both petitioners….We can be arrested at any time, and we can disappear at any time.

Ai, a petitioner in Beijing

China’s petitioning system is a unique cultural and legal tradition with deep historical roots. Although it has taken different forms over the centuries, it dates to the beginnings of the Chinese empire. Early Confucian texts refer to commoners submitting memorials to the emperor about their complaints. In China’s last imperial dynasty, the Qing (1644-1911), petitioners traveled to Beijing and sometimes waited outside the gates of the emperor’s palace on their knees, or tried to intercept imperial processions, to present their appeals.¹

Today, their descendants stage sit-ins in front of Zhongnanhai, the Beijing compound where China’s leaders live and work, and try to push their petitions into their limousines. Thousands of others throng Beijing’s streets in front of national petitions offices, holding up signs that describe their cases. Their numbers swell during major political conventions. These petitioners, many of them rural people with minimal education or resources, often come to Beijing fleeing local violence and seeking the venue of last resort.

This report is the first in-depth look at what happens to petitioners who attempt to find redress for grievances within China's petitioning system. Research was carried out in China. The stories of abuse we heard––and which we report in the words of petitioners themselves––were chilling, and confirm anecdotal accounts previously published. These
abuses call for urgent measures to protect petitioners from systematic violence and ill-treatment.

The words most commonly translated as “petition” are xinfang (信访), literally “letters and visits,” or shangfang (上访), “visiting higher [authorities].” Under the petitioning system, citizens unsatisfied with the decisions handed down by local officials or local courts may write letters of complaint or appear in person at special petition bureaus throughout the country. If petitioners are unsatisfied with the response to a petition they have the right to continue up the chain of petition bureaus all the way from the village level to the township, county, provincial, and national levels.

It is estimated that a staggering ten million petitions were filed in 2004.² According to the People’s Daily, “An official survey revealed that 40 percent of these complaints are about police, courts and prosecutors’ offices, 33 percent about government, 13 percent about corruption and 11 percent about injustice.”³  Other specific subjects often named in petitions include environmental problems, workplace complaints, and forced evictions.

Most petitions are filed at the local level, but frustration with the lack of action has led to a dramatic increase in the number of appeals to Beijing and in the number of cases filed directly with national instead of local petitions offices. According to official statistics, in the first quarter of 2005, the number of petition cases submitted in writing to the State Council Petitions Bureau in Beijing increased 99.4 percent, and the number of visitors to the bureau increased 94.9 percent, compared to letters and visits during the same period in 2004.⁴ In 2003, the State Bureau of Letters and Visits received 14 percent more petitions than in 2002.⁵

In principle, petitioning is encouraged by the government and Party. The right to petition is guaranteed under Chinese law and by the constitution⁶, reflecting the historical role that petitioning has played in Chinese governance. With few other channels to raise grievances, and without a free press or the right to freedom of association or assembly, the petitioning system acts as a necessary pressure release valve for a government and Party that, in a political system lacking accountability to its own citizens, often finds itself out of touch with ground realities or the views of ordinary people. The petitioning system can therefore be an asset, bringing problem areas, such as corruption, to the attention of senior officials before they create mass dissatisfaction with the political system.

Yet the government and Party display a highly contradictory and inconsistent attitude towards petitioners. While in some cases national authorities encourage local authorities to resolve a petitioner’s problems, if for no other reason than to prevent petitioners from clogging Beijing’s streets, such success carries its own risks, as the very officials ordered to “resolve” these cases may be the same people who committed the original abuses.

In reality, success for petitioners is quite rare. A 2004 study by a Chinese professor, Yu Jianrong of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, found that of the two thousand petitioners surveyed, only three had their problems resolved.⁷ Only two out of a thousand petitioners who take their cases to national-level petitioning offices ever receive a written response.⁸ Problems occur at all levels of the petitioning system––village, township, county, provincial, and national. In a one-party state, such an exceedingly low rate of success or response has political implications, raising questions about whether the system is intended to redress grievances or simply create the appearance that it is possible to challenge officialdom.

However, the worst aspect of the system is the retaliation that many petitioners experience. Petitioners are often beaten, intimidated, and even kidnapped for airing their grievances. Professor Yu’s report states that over 50 percent of respondents reported that they had been beaten by state actors or agents.⁹ The report noted:

It is publicly known that some local governments use violence to stop petitioners from making their case to central government departments. The retaliation by some local governments against the petitioners is appalling and outrageous.¹⁰

Indeed, petitioners told Human Rights Watch that while they wait for their petitions to be addressed, many are ambushed by groups of plainclothes security officers on the street, beaten, kidnapped, and taken back to their home provinces, where some are imprisoned and even tortured. A few petitioners who spoke to Human Rights Watch had lost the use of limbs due to torture in detention (but said that they intended to continue petitioning nonetheless). The perpetrators of these abuses are usually state actors or agents. They are rarely disciplined; Human Rights Watch knows of no successful prosecutions.

Our research found that much of the violence and abuse against petitioners in Beijing emanates from efforts by local officials to stop local residents from going to Beijing to petition. To accomplish this, local officials often send shadowy “retrievers” (jiefang renyuan)––plain-clothes security officers––who attack and intimidate petitioners to deter them from pursuing their claims and force them to return to their home province. Beijing police, in turn, play their part: to quell the threat of rising discontent, they raze the shantytowns where petitioners live in Beijing, round up petitioners by the thousands, and turn many of them over to the retrievers, turning a blind eye to the retaliatory violence.

This is especially likely to take place during major political meetings, a time when petitioners flood Beijing in an attempt to seek help from powerful senior officials, and a time when the city is under greater pressure to put forward a positive public image. For example, during the “Two Meetings”(liang hui) in 2005, the spring meetings of China’s National People’s Congress and the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Congress, Beijing police issued statements that stability was a priority and that local governments should see to it that petitioning problems were resolved at the local level and that petitioning in Beijing was kept to a minimum.¹¹ Subsequently, Beijing police rounded up several thousand petitioners, detaining them in the basement of a gymnasium.¹² Such practices raise concerns that similar “sweeps” may take place in the run-up to the 2008 Beijing Olympics. 

Once handed over to the retrievers, petitioners are forcibly returned to their home provinces. As many petitioners go to Beijing because of complaints of official or police violence, sending them back to the provinces often exposes them to grave dangers. While most petitioners are released in their hometowns and simply board the next bus back to Beijing, some are imprisoned without charges, or are sentenced to reeducation through labor camps. In prison and in the reeducation camps, some petitioners say they have been tortured. Falungong practitioners appear to be singled out for frequent arrest and harsh treatment.

Local authorities, who face criticism from superiors if too many petitioners go to Beijing, often see petitioners as a serious threat. Petitioners draw negative attention to the home province. Worse, petitioners are a threat to the financial wellbeing of local officials, as their pay includes incentives tied to indicators of social stability, such as the number of petitions received at national government offices. Large numbers of petitions results in cadres receiving lower annual or quarterly bonuses, or no bonuses at all, giving these officials a direct financial incentive to keep petitioners away from Beijing.

Despite severe retaliation, or perhaps because of it, many petitioners are tenacious in pursuit of their claims, pursuing their cases through every available channel for many years. Some spend years, even decades, in Beijing. A few families have become petitioning dynasties, passing the torch from one generation to the next. Some spend their life savings in the petitioning system, sinking deeper into poverty until they become homeless. Abuses tend to accumulate quickly on those persistent enough to challenge the state.

“Farmers might not have any education or understand anything about the legal system,” says a Chinese lawyer familiar with many cases:

They just know this: they can petition….The petitioning system shows a deep concern with fairness in Chinese society, a deep-rooted belief in Chinese culture that if you speak reasonably, you will get a good result.¹³

Petitioners’ problems are often compounded by official prejudice and discrimination. They are commonly seen as “country bumpkins,” uneducated peasants who don't have access to mainstream mechanisms of dispute resolution. While the exact impact these attitudes have on the outcomes of petitions is difficult to measure, these prejudices are so widespread and pervasive that they must be considered in any assessment of the petitioning process.

The lack of effective remedies elsewhere in the Chinese justice system has driven large numbers of rural and impoverished urban residents to Beijing to seek redress. Those interviewed for this report were among the minority who were not discouraged by violence, inaction, or retaliation and continued to pursue their cases. Beatings and threats lead many others to drop their cases and return home. Many more people likely decide against complaining in the first place because of the lack of an independent judiciary, the lack of confidentiality, and the high risk of retaliation, which combine to create a climate of fear.

For some who fled their home provinces to avoid retaliation by local officials or police, it is impossible to return, and China’s restrictive household registration laws mean that many petitioners cannot move to new towns to start again. Instead, they live in a permanent limbo, waiting for a reply from the state that will enable them to return home and pick up their lives again. Thousands of petitioners live in a “petitioners’ village” near Beijing’s South Station, surviving on scraps picked up on the street. Their numbers include some children. In winter, some die of exposure.

In response to the growing numbers of petitioners, Chinese activists have begun to organize mass protests in Beijing and to try to establish nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) to assist them. In January, Zhou Zhanshun, the head of China’s main petitions office, the State Bureau of Letters and Visits, admitted that “civic protests were on the rise” and expressed “concerns that angry citizens were increasingly organized across regions and industries” and that demonstrations were growing in size.¹⁴ The response has been harsh. An appendix to this report lists sixteen activists who have been imprisoned or who have disappeared as a result of their advocacy for petitioners. Several have been imprisoned after filing applications for permits to hold legal demonstrations. NGOs report harassment.

Senior Chinese officials are aware of the problems with the petitioning system. There have been some attempts to address them, if only to head off rising public discontent with China’s unresponsive political system. After Professor Yu’s findings were made public, foreign and Chinese news sources began publishing articles detailing the system’s shortcomings and the abysmal conditions in the petitioners’ village.¹⁵ The People’s Daily admitted that some “high-profile areas where the central organs of power” are located often “receive hundreds of petitioners each day.”¹⁶ Soon after, officials of the Legislative Affairs Office of the State Council and the State Bureau for Letters and Calls “acknowledged that problems exist in the current work of handling petitions, such as inadequate channels, lack of supervision, and [irresponsible] officials.”¹⁷ The Anhui Province Public Security Chief, Cui Yadong, commented:

I felt ashamed when the petitioners [thanked] me, because most of their problems could have been solved earlier if our police staff had paid enough attention.¹⁸

In response to this flurry of criticism, the government issued new regulations that went into effect on May 1, 2005. These have been promoted around the country and internationally as strengthening the petitioning system and providing new protections for the rights of petitioners. They include a few new provisions, such as requiring that a petitioner first exhaust options at the local petitioning bureau before appealing to the next level of government authority, but they fail to address the dilemma that petitioners face in having to appeal for relief to the very government organs responsible for the initial violation.

As part of a national campaign launched after the implementation of the May 2005 regulations, Chinese Minister of Public Security Zhou Yongkang ordered local police to address complaints by petitioners. A month after the campaign was launched, the ministry reported that 71.7 percent of complaints had been resolved.¹⁹ This is not a credible assertion. It is either intentionally misleading, using an ambiguous term such as “resolved”––which doesn’t mean that valid claims were accepted––or simply a piece of official propaganda.

In any case, the problems of retaliation documented in this report are unlikely to be addressed in a meaningful way by this campaign; in practice, they may actually be exacerbated by additional pressure on local officials and police to “resolve” complaints against them. In August 2005, the State Bureau for Letters and Visits warned against “unreasonable demands” by petitioners, an indication that the state remains at least as concerned with maintaining control over the number of petitioners and, hence, social order, as with ensuring fairness and justice for petitioners.²⁰

Reports from petitioners and their advocates indicate that in the weeks before the May 1 regulations went into effect, police launched a crackdown on petitioners aimed at driving them out of Beijing. Those interviewed by Human Rights Watch after May 1 also said that the retrievers, while retreating across the street from Beijing petitions offices, continued to lie in wait for petitioners. Petitioners say that Beijing police are not implementing provisions of the regulations aimed at ending violence against petitioners and putting retrievers out of business. Police often ignore emergency (“110”) calls by petitioners. Instead, they often appear determined to chase petitioners out of Beijing. In doing so, they often send petitioners back to the very same officials who, were the source of the original complaints. Thus the reforms, combined with the crackdown on petitioners who do make it to Beijing, have given the system a nightmarish circularity in which the state response to petitioners also gives rise to more abuses about which to petition.

The new regulations also fail to address crucial systemic problems, such as the generally acknowledged fact that, even in the tiny minority of cases in which petitioners receive an official letter in response, these letters have no actual power to compel action.

The system clearly needs substantial reform. The imperial appeals system, reestablished by the Chinese Communist Party in the 1950s, has been codified in national, provincial and metropolitan regulations. It has since ballooned into a massive bureaucratic system that encompasses petitions offices for a number of government agencies at every level of the country. While the system has grown, it has not kept pace with the demand. Jurisdictional lines are unclear, so that many petitioners pursue the same case in multiple complaint procedures at once.

Like all states, China is obligated to provide routes to redress for abuses of human rights. Under international law, all persons have the right to a remedy when their basic rights are violated. Article 2(3) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), which China has signed but has not ratified, states that states party to the covenant undertake:

a) To ensure that any person whose rights or freedoms as herein recognized are violated shall have an effective remedy, notwithstanding that the violation has been committed by persons acting in an official capacity;

b) To ensure that any person claiming such a remedy shall have his right thereto determined by competent judicial, administrative or legislative authorities, or by any other competent authority provided for by the legal system of the State, and to develop the possibilities of judicial remedy;

c) To ensure that the competent authorities shall enforce such remedies when granted.²¹

However, these obligations are not being met. As a modern system of redress, the petitioning system has failed in part because it does not have the necessary elements of independence, impartiality, competence, transparency, professionalism, and non-discrimination to make it function fairly. At present there are no publicly established criteria upon which decisions are made, no system of publishing decisions with legally sound explanations, and no independent bodies to review the decisions of civil servants. In short, fairness is not built into the system.

There are also severe structural problems. The relationship with the administrative law system and the court system is confused and, indeed, circular. Petitions may be made to the courts against adverse executive branch decisions; they may also be made to the executive branch against adverse court decisions (thereby vitiating the principle of independence of the judiciary). It is not even clear what decisions the system can make, and whether the decisions by petitions offices are final or binding.

There is a raging debate in China about whether to keep or abolish the system. Abolitionists argue that the system is inherently arbitrary and at odds with the protection of human rights and the rule of law. Others suggest it should be overhauled but remain in place, as petitioning offers average Chinese perhaps the only legally condoned avenue to raise what, in many cases, are essentially political grievances. Those who support the current system should realize that the longer that abuse and lack of fairness remain the salient characteristics of the system, the more likely it will be that abolitionists will ultimately win the argument.  

Recommendations

The Chinese government and the CCP should act immediately to end the violence, kidnapping, and intimidation of petitioners. The place to start is to put retrievers out of business. The May 1, 2005 regulations have been ineffective in limiting abuses by retrievers, as can be seen in photos taken by Human Rights Watch (on page 44 of this report) of retrievers waiting across the street from petitioning offices in Beijing after May 1, waiting to pounce on petitioners. Chinese authorities know who the retrievers are; most are state employees, such as police officers, or are commissioned by state officials. 

The government and Party must send instructions to all local authorities that the practice of sending retrievers to Beijing is prohibited and make it clear that individuals who persist in hiring retrievers will also be held accountable under the criminal law. The criminal law prohibits the violence, kidnapping, and threats used by retrievers. The police and prosecutors should apply this law in a public and highly visible way to send the message that this practice will not be tolerated in a country that claims to be moving towards the rule of law. The government must investigate the use of police and other agents of the state who beat, threaten, and kidnap petitioners and take appropriate criminal and disciplinary measures against those who carry out these abuses and the officials who order them or turn a blind eye to these methods.

The Chinese government also must insist the Beijing police officers protect the public––including petitioners––from violence and kidnapping that occurs literally in their sight. Instead of responding to protect petitioners, police often look the other way when local thugs come up from the provinces. Police officers should have the confidence that acting to protect members of the public, even when intervening against retrievers employed by powerful government or Party officials, will not lead to retaliation against them within the police service. Instead, they should be trained to understand that the failure to intervene is a dereliction of duty that will lead to sanctions.

The Chinese government should act immediately to release from all forms of detention all petitioners detained in retaliation for exercising their legal right to petition. It should release all petitioner activists imprisoned detained for protesting and for applying for permits to hold legal demonstrations.

The Chinese government should also change the current incentive system for officials working in the petitioning system. One reason why retrievers are so prevalent and so zealous is the current incentive system that rewards officials for keeping the number of petitions down. The system should be turned on its head, with incentives based on the fair and expeditious resolution of legitimate complaints as a sign of a willingness to accept the need for an appeals process and a more open political system. Further, national authorities should make it clear to local officials that the presence of retrievers in Beijing is evidence of an undesirable and inadequate response to appeals and will negatively affect the responsible officials.

Corruption also has to be addressed––not just the corruption that often leads to a petition being filed in the first place, but the corruption within administrative and judicial structures that often makes it impossible for petitioners with legitimate complaints to gain redress.

The May 1 regulations have not made the petitioning system fair, impartial, and effective. It is unclear if the weaknesses in the regulations represent a technical failure that can be addressed through expert advice or if ambiguity was deliberately written into the new regulations. In either case, a decision to redraft the regulations or to create new legislation should entail a more open process that allows for public input and comment and incorporates more perspectives, including those of petitioners.

Petitions offices in Beijing are chaotic. For the system to be functional, it is important to increase the number and quality of staff in petitioning offices. Even well-intentioned staff are often overwhelmed by the amount of work they have to process, as a single petition can run up to a hundred pages or more, handwritten by lay-people with the issues often jumbled up without context. 

The government should also attempt to make legal aid available to those who cannot afford a lawyer. The many legal aid initiatives around China, often funded by international donors, should take into account the acute needs of petitioners for help in presenting their claims in the petitioning system, in the administrative law system, or in courts. 

China should also change current rules and allow petitioners in Beijing to work while in Beijing. The government should offer social services to allow petitioners basic human dignity and the necessities of survival while they pursue their claims.

To increase the public’s faith in having their grievances resolved fairly, the government needs to strengthen its administrative law mechanisms and the court system, particularly at the provincial and local level. In this way meritorious claims could be resolved through administrative law or judicial processes. For some petitioners, at least, this will save time and money and bring finality to their cases. But for these reforms to be meaningful, the administrative law system and the courts must develop some core values––independence, impartiality, competence, transparency, professionalism, and non-discrimination––to make them function fairly and effectively.

While other countries with courts and administrative law systems that operate consistent with international standards can offer valuable technical assistance, no serious progress will be possible without fundamental reform. The creation of an independent judiciary, which involves separating the state from the Party, is a political decision that has to be taken at the highest levels of the government and Party. Local and national governance structures have to be radically changed to allow for popular participation and public accountability. Perhaps most important for petitioners, China has to establish systems to provide for genuine grass-roots accountability to communities and citizens. Unfortunately, there are no signs yet that the Chinese leadership is ready to accept the need for such basic reforms.

China and some of the more optimistic members of the international community have hailed China’s stated commitment to protecting human rights and creating the rule of law as a sign of the country’s development and modernization. But implementation is the real test. An end to abuses against petitioners should be seen inside China and by the international community as an indicator of the seriousness of China’s commitment.

[1] Jonathan K. Ocko, “I’ll take it all the way to Beijing: Capital appeals in the Qing,” Journal of Asian Studies, vol. 47.2 (May 1988), p. 294.

[2] Josephine Ma, “Petition reforms a bid to ease social tensions,” South China Morning Post, November 17, 2004. Many petitioners submit complaints to multiple offices at multiple levels of the system, so numbers of individual cases are likely fewer; however, many petitioners also submit complaints on behalf of large groups.

[3] People’s Daily, January 6, 2005, at http://english.people.com.cn/200501/06/eng20050106_169769.html.

[4] Josephine Ma, “Petitioners losing faith, report warns,” South China Morning Post, November 19, 2004.

[5] Yu Jianrong, "Xinfang Zhidu Pipan (Critique of the Petition System)" December 5, 2004 [online], http://www.yannan.cn/data/detail.php?id=4842 (retrieved July 10, 2005).

[6] Article 41 of the constitution states, “Citizens of the People's Republic of China have the right to criticize and make suggestions to any state organ or functionary. Citizens have the right to make to relevant state organs complaints and charges against, or exposures of, violation of the law or dereliction of duty by any state organ or functionary; but fabrication or distortion of facts with the intention of libel or frame-up is prohibited. In case of complaints, charges or exposures made by citizens, the state organ concerned must deal with them in a responsible manner after ascertaining the facts. No one may suppress such complaints, charges and exposures, or retaliate against the citizens making them. Citizens who have suffered losses through infringement of their civil rights by any state organ or functionary have the right to compensation in accordance with the law.

[7] Irene Wang, “Petition offices told to act faster,” South China Morning Post, January 18, 2005.

[8] Ma, “Petition reforms a bid to ease social tensions,” South China Morning Post.

[9] Jianrong, "Xinfang Zhidu Pipan (Critique of the Petition System)."

[10] Ibid. See also Ma, “Petition reforms a bid to ease social tensions,” South China Morning Post.

[11] “Zhonggong lianghui qi, Beijing yanqi shangfang shensu qingyuan (During Central government Two Meetings period, Beijing severely forbids petitioning and appealing),” Dajiyuan, March 20, 2005 [online], http://www.dajiyuan.com/gb/4/3/10/n482497.htm (retrieved July 26, 2005); “Lianghui zai ji, Beijing jiaqiang xinfang cuoshi” (As Two Meetings near, Beijing strengthens petitioning measures), BBCChinese.com, February 26, 2005 [online], http://news.bbc.co.uk/chinese/simp/low/newsid_4300000/newsid_4300800/4300879.stm (retrieved July 26, 2005).

[12] “Beijing police herd petitioners into camp-style detention,” Radio Free Asia, September 10, 2004 [online], http://www.rfa.org/english/news/politics/2004/09/10/china_petitioners/ (retrieved 28 November, 2005).

[13] Human Rights Watch interview with Zhou, lawyer, Beijing, 2005.

[14]“New Petitioning Rules in Pipeline,” China Daily, January 15, 2004 [online], http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/en/doc/2004-01/14/content_298950.htm (retrieved November 28, 2005).

[15]For example: “Top Legislators Heed Concerns of Common Folks”, Xinhuanet, March 12, 2004 [online], http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2004-03/11/content_1360958.htm (retrieved November 26, 2005) on the website of the Supreme People’s Court of the People’s Republic of China (http://en.chinacourt.org/); “Chinese Courts Report Increasing Number of Petitions in 2004”, People’s Daily, March 9, 2005 [online], http:// english.people.com.cn/200503/09/eng20050309_176148.html (retrieved November 24, 2005); “Right to appeal guaranteed”, People’s Daily, March 14, 2004 [online], http://english.people.com.cn/200401/15/eng20040115_132654.shtml (retrieved November 24, 2005); “国内首份信访报告获高层重视” (The First Domestic Report on Petitioning Receives High Level Attention), Nanfang Zhoumo, November 4, 2004 [online], http://www.nanfangdaily.com.cn/zm/20041104/xw/szxw1/200411040012.asp (retrieved November 24, 2005).

[16] “New Petitioning Rules in Pipeline,” China Daily.

[17] China to better protect petitioners’ rights, People’s Daily Online, January 18, 2005 [online], http://english.people.com.cn/200501/18/eng20050118_170922.html (retrieved November 28, 2005).

[18] “All 3,000 police chiefs to hold face-to-face meetings with petitioners”, People’s Daily Online, May 19, 2005 [online], http://english.people.com.cn/200505/19/eng20050519_185707.html (retrieved November 28, 2005).

[19] “Police heads ordered to well handle petitioners,” People’s Daily, July 23, 2005 [online], http://english1.peopledaily.com.cn/200507/23/print20050723_197811.html (retrieved July 23, 2005).

[20] Vivien Cui, “Beijing warns against abusing petitioning system to disrupt social order,” South China Morning Post, August 1, 2005.

[21] Article 2(3), International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), (1976).

II. Research Methods

Human Rights Watch conducted field research for this report in Beijing for two weeks in 2005. Human Rights Watch researchers conducted interviews with thirty-four petitioners as well as with six lawyers, activists and journalists who have expertise on the petitioners issue.

Of the thirty-four petitioners who spoke to Human Rights Watch, twenty-four were men and ten were women. Most came from China’s north and central provinces: fifteen were from Beijing and the vicinity, five were from Shanxi, four were from Shandong, three from Henan, two each from Heilongjiang and Liaoning, and one each from Anhui, Jilin, and Ningxia. Excepting one Manchurian and one Hui, all other interviewees were majority Hans. While Beijing reportedly has a large number of ethnic minority petitioners, many were reluctant to be interviewed for security reasons.

Interviews were conducted in settings that were as private as possible. All interviews were conducted in Mandarin. In addition, Human Rights Watch collected information from Chinese and English-language news accounts, scholarly journals, and archives in China, the United States, and the Internet.

In 2004, a volunteer collected statements, court documents and other supporting materials relating to the cases of an additional fifteen petitioners, and donated these case files to Human Rights Watch.

The scope of this study is necessarily limited by the information accessible to Human Rights Watch given the research constraints in China. China remains closed to official research by international human rights organizations. Over the years, Human Rights Watch has received numerous reports of the detention and interrogation of Chinese activists and scholars because of their contact with international human rights groups. As this report documents, Chinese activists working with petitioners also believe that they are closely monitored, and some have been interrogated or jailed for their work.

Because of these concerns, Human Rights Watch took a number of precautions while conducting field research. Researchers did not request interviews with government officials on the petitioning issue while in China, but did write to China’s representatives in Washington, D.C. to request an interview.

Unless otherwise noted, we have used pseudonyms for Chinese citizens throughout. In most cases, petitioners requested that Human Rights Watch omit names and alter characteristics of interviewees. None of the petitioners interviewed appear in any of the photographs used in this report. Human Rights Watch looks forward to the day when it is safe for Chinese citizens to speak and meet openly with international human rights groups.

Human Rights Watch takes no position on the underlying merits of the petitions described in this report. The focus of this report is on what happens to petitioners after they file a petition.

III. The Petitioning System

All of China isn’t corrupt, because if it were it would be total chaos. But all you need is for half of the people to be corrupt.

Yuan, a rural petitioner, Beijing 2005

The modern petitioning system is the product of a long history. For centuries under China’s imperial systems, commoners had the right to report official misconduct or to appeal judicial or administrative decisions to higher levels of government. ²²

Petitioning is an indigenous cultural and legal tradition that has long buttressed a rigid hierarchy. In many respects, it is an expression of the Confucian philosophy that was the basis of Chinese feudalism: petitioning is premised on appeals by commoners to the better nature of their rulers, a plea for the protection of one’s superiors. Superiors are not required to intercede, but may choose to do so, depending on their degree of benevolence.

Early Confucian texts refer to commoners submitting memorials with their complaints to the emperor. Later, during the Ming (1368-1644) and Qing (1644-1911) dynasties, Chinese citizens were able to present written appeals to imperial censors relating to official misdeeds or incorrect legal decisions by local magistrates. Petitioners who received no redress or who were dissatisfied would go continuously up the chain of command, some eventually traveling to the imperial capital. Once there, an appellant could:

[B]ang the “grievance drum” outside the offices of the censorate and the capital gendarmerie (bujun tongling yamen), both of which were authorized to accept capital appeals….To…reach the emperor directly by either kneeling before the palace gate…was not impossible but was illegal…[but] the hope was not farfetched since emperors seem to have been sympathetically predisposed to capital appeals.²³

In the waning days of the Qing empire, problems became increasingly apparent in the imperial appeals system: the number of appellants increased rapidly, “swamping the ability of imperial institutions to handle” the complaints.²⁴ Local officials and warlords began to struggle with petitioners in the attempt to cover up local problems.²⁵

Party leaders reestablished the petitioning system in the early 1950s, using the petitioning system as a source of information that assisted the Party in consolidating political control.²⁶ In the 1980s, the petitioning system gradually expanded to establish specific complaint offices within the government, courts, procuratorates, and people’s congresses.

The Petitioning System in Theory and Practice

In essence, the petitioning system functions as a general complaints system for complaints about any government misdeed, ranging from minor bureaucratic infractions to official corruption and police torture. Petitioners submit statements describing their complaints, and petitions offices are supposed to review the complaints, investigate the cases, and issue a letter about the matter. In some cases, a petitions office may transfer the case to a different government agency.

In theory, the petitioning system establishes a mechanism for independent review of local government. In practice, the petitioning system is overwhelmed by the quantity of complaints, while officials often have a disincentive to process complaints about their misdeeds or those of their colleagues.

Petitions offices range in size depending on the region and available resources; they can be a separate office inside a government bureau or Communist Party office, or merely a desk within a local office.²⁷ Today, every level of people’s government at and above the county level is required to create a petitions department of some kind. All government departments at or above the county level or at the town or township level are required to assign a work unit or individual to be responsible for all petitions.²⁸ Provincial regulations “often require the creation of a [petition department] at every local people’s congress, court, and procuratorate at the county level and above.”²⁹ In practice, for a variety of reasons, petitions may drag on for many years without resolution.

According to the latest set of national regulations, petitions offices must review a complaint brought in writing or in person within fifteen days, and either issue some suggestions on the case, or refer it to be handled by the relevant government agency.³⁰ If the matter is handled by that agency, the agency concerned must also issue a decision within fifteen days.³¹ The department that handles the matter must investigate the case, and may choose to hold a hearing.³² After investigating, the agency should issue some kind of written notice or letter.³³ According to the current regulations, the case should be handled within sixty days of the time when it is submitted to the petitions bureau; agencies may extend this time limit for complex cases up to thirty more days.³⁴

As a system of redress, the petitioning system has generally failed. The growing numbers of petitioners and petitions are too many for the system to handle. Most petitioners––and for that matter, many officials––are never entirely sure at which level of government a petitioner should file her or his complaint, nor is it clear exactly what kinds of petitions should be handled by which departments. As this report documents, some petitions are transferred repeatedly from bureau to bureau. Should a bureau decide it has the power to handle a certain petition, the existing regulations make it unclear what exactly any one official or department has the power to do, aside from reprimanding other petition officials for mishandling petitions. Moreover, in a relic of the imperial legal system, few decisions are ever final.³⁵ As a result, many petitioners from around the country become frustrated with their provincial and local petitioning systems and eventually take their complaints to Beijing.

Once in Beijing, many petitioners travel from bureau to bureau, trying their luck at each. One website lists over fifty petitioning offices at various ministries and government organs in Beijing alone.³⁶ According to the Chinese Academy for Social Sciences survey, petitioners interviewed had visited an average of six different bureaus in Beijing, while some have been to as many as eighteen. These included the National Bureau of Letters and Visits, the State Council, the Supreme Court, the Communist Party Central Disciplinary Commission, the Public Security Bureau, the Supreme People’s Procuratorate, the National Bureau of Land Resources, the Agriculture Bureau, and the Civil Administration Bureau.³⁷

                           Petitions posted outside the Chinese Supreme Court building in Beijing.

                            ©2005 Private

Each petitioning bureau is required to have a “reception place” and petitioners are allowed to present complaints only at these designated sites.³⁸ Facilities differ. The petitions office of the State Bureau of Letters and Visits is a small, often dirty room with neither chairs nor tables. Petitioners are required to line up in front of a small reception window to air their grievances and present their petitions and materials while standing.³⁹ The Beijing Municipal Government Office of Letters and Visits has a slightly nicer room with chairs where petitioners may sit while waiting for their turn at the window.⁴⁰

These offices are always crowded, and often petitioners gather outside the buildings, carrying placards or wearing white shirts on which are painted narratives detailing their case. Some petitioners who come from other provinces bring children and elder relatives to stand in line with them. Many petitioners carry around not only copies of their written statements, but also bundles of evidence. These can include a typed or handwritten statement summarizing the case, often accompanied by sheaves of evidence: court decisions, past correspondence with officials, photographs, and testimony by witnesses. Others have recounted their stories to so many different officials that all relevant dates and facts have long been memorized.

Lack of Effective Remedies

While China’s government continues to be a hierarchical one, and provincial authorities must answer to their superiors, on matters that are not considered a governmental or Party priority, national-level authorities often have little direct control over low-level officials at the county, township and village level. A letter from a national office to a local official does not compel a response, and some local officials simply choose to disregard them.

Perhaps because it can take many years of petitioning in Beijing to obtain one, some petitioners who receive a written response view them with high regard, even though the letters themselves are ineffectual, notes a lawyer who has assisted many petitioners:

One of my clients was an intellectual whose son got into a conflict, was taken to the police station, and came out dead. The police said that nothing had happened and that he had died of natural causes. His father took a stack of photographs of him, and you could see all over his body were stab wounds and bruises…

The father appealed and appealed, and he lost one suit after another as he went up the system—even the [provincial] supreme court. Finally, he started petitioning…[and eventually], he got a statement from the [national] petitioning office saying, ‘Please will the [provincial] court investigate this case.’

It was a treasure to him, he kept it carefully and he showed it off to everyone. But of course, there was no power to implement it.⁴¹

Most official responses from petitions offices are similar: they are usually just form letters from to local authorities, requesting that they “investigate” or “take care of” the individual case locally. However, petitioners say that these letters rarely carry much weight with the officials who receive them.

Of the forty-nine petitioners who were interviewed in person or whose cases were documented by Human Rights Watch, eight had received a letter from a national office directing local officials to take care of their cases.⁴² Only one of those had been able to resolve his case as a result of the letter, and then only after he and a group of his neighbors physically threatened the local official with violence if he did not resolve the case.⁴³ One petitioner described the response he got from a local official in Shanxi:

I gave them the letter, and the official laughed at me and threw it right into the garbage. I said, ‘How can you throw that in the garbage?’ He said, ‘What does this have to do with us? We don’t care.’⁴⁴

Another said that when he presented his letter from the national petitions office to the head of the provincial police bureau, the response was equally dismissive:

The letter said, ‘Only the provincial Public Security office can handle this case. It is a case of retaliation. Please take it over.’ The province sent the letter to the city. After over twenty days, I got a letter and I went to the city police.

[The police officer] said to me, ‘We’ve handled this matter plenty already. We’ve seen a lot of these letters. They’re all just wasted paper, no use.’ He said, ‘You can go wherever you want, take the case up with anyone you want. Go to the U.N. if you want!… Eventually, we’ll come and arrest you.’⁴⁵

In an effort to get local officials to respect the orders of the national offices, some petitioners who have had their letters scoffed at continue to return to Beijing to petition for many years. A Human Rights Watch researcher congratulated Mao on receiving a letter from the national Supreme People’s Court. He responded angrily:

I have over twenty of those letters! I have over twenty letters from the Supreme People’s Court, and they all say the same thing….I asked the head of the Court petitions office, ‘What use are your letters?…He said to me directly, ‘They’re no use.’ So now they have stopped giving me letters.⁴⁶

Why do Petitioners Persist?

For non-Chinese observers, perhaps the most puzzling feature of China’s petitioning system is the fact that so many people participate in it at all, especially those who spend much of their lives pursuing hopeless appeals in the face of serious risks. The reasons for this persistence vary, and can include a range of cultural, psychological, and pragmatic factors.

A small number of petitioners almost certainly suffer from grave psychological illnesses; a petitions office official in Beijing told one reporter that he estimated 3 percent of petitioners were “psychologically chaotic.”⁴⁷ For others, economic motivations drive them on: these petitioners believe that a decision in their favor will lead to a sizeable cash settlement that will compensate them for their effort.⁴⁸

But a much larger proportion of petitioners appear to be simply driven by the desire to obtain justice and vindicate their human dignity, and may well spend years of their lives trapped in the petitioning system in the belief that a decision in their favor will justify the time spent in the effort. This is not unique to China: individuals pursuing apparently lost causes are a not uncommon feature of any court system. Some such cases are described in Charles Dickens’ novel Bleak House, which depicts Victorian-era plaintiffs driven into poverty and madness over decades spent pursuing their hopeless lawsuits. Contemporary parallels exist in many countries: a U.S. reporter writing about long-term appellants for alimony in New York City observes, “In their seemingly endless court battles, litigants on both sides often become overwhelmed, depressed, or if they are going to become at all successful, obsessed.”⁴⁹

Lawsuits against government or the ruling party filed in an independent court system, however, have a chance of winning. But the odds are stacked against petitioners, no matter how persistent they may be. How do petitioners become obsessed? There are numerous cultural factors that can help to explain this process. Many long-term petitioners who spoke to Human Rights Watch were rural people who turned to petitioning because they had few or no other options. Notes one Chinese lawyer, “Farmers might not have any education or understand anything about the legal system. They just know this: they can petition.”⁵⁰

Many petitioners who continue over the long term also have a deep-rooted faith in the Communist Party, and believe that a rational explanation of their case will receive a fair hearing, if they can only find an official highly-placed enough to be truly objective about their personal situations. Some of these petitioners described themselves as engaging in a test of their own faith in the Chinese Communist party.

But while these rural petitioners may see themselves as Communists, their beliefs about the benevolence of officials in fact hews more closely to China’s Confucian traditions. Confucianism emphasizes the obligation of higher-status people to behave with benevolence toward powerless, lower-status people. Thus many rural petitioners will thrust their case portfolios at any Beijing passerby who appears higher-placed than themselves in the class hierarchy, whether that person is a Chinese official, a journalist, or a foreign visitor.

Status and reputation or “face” are also important motivations for farmers from the Confucian-influenced countryside. Some petitioners may have spent so much of their own and their families’ savings that to return home without success would be an intolerable humiliation, more painful even than a life spent living from scraps in Beijing.

However, along with the many and debatable cultural reasons for petitioning, there is also a more clear-cut one that is documented by this report: a few petitioners told Human Rights Watch they could not give up and return home because they believed they would face retaliation there. There literally is nowhere else for these petitioners to go: China’s restrictive hukou or household registration system makes it nearly impossible for most Chinese families to move to a new town, stay with relatives and find new jobs, and start their lives over.⁵¹ In some cases, the petitioners’ village in Beijing has become a de facto internal refugee camp for villagers fleeing official violence.⁵²

Petitioning and Activism

The answers to Professor Yu’s survey were revealing. Only 5.8 percent responded that they would give up petitioning. Over 91 percent responded that they would never give up even if they saw no results. The survey also shows that experienced petitioners often become organizers: 85.5 percent responded that they would begin “publicizing (xuanchuan) government policies and laws to move/inspire (fadong) the masses to protect their own rights,” 68.2 percent responded that they would set up an organization to legally protect the rights of farmers (chengli zuzhi, yifa weihu nonngmin de hefa quanyi), and 70.2 percent responded that they would “organize the masses to open a dialogue and speak directly to the government” (zhijie zhao zhengfu duihua, tanpan). The survey also pointed out that many petitioners are willing to go beyond organizing: 53.6 percent responded that they would “do something to scare the cadres a little” and 87.3 percent responded that they were in a life or death struggle with corrupt cadres––translated literally, the expression used was that the “net will rip or the fish will die” [鱼死网破].

Recent Reforms

In response to the study by Professor Yu of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences detailing problems with the petitioning system and subsequent press coverage, in May 2004 the government opened a high-level discussion of problems in the petitioning system.⁵³ In January 2005, the State Council passed a revised version of the national Regulations on Letters and Visits, which came into effect in May 2005.

Shortly thereafter, the government launched a national campaign to address police abuse, and reported by the end of May that police bureaus had heard over 47,000 petitions on the subject and had already “solved completely” 7,695 of these.⁵⁴ There was no definition of the term “solved completely” and whether this meant the problem had been solved to the petitioners’ satisfaction or that the case file had simply been closed. By late July, public security bureaus had received 140,000 petitions, and reported that 104,439 of them had been “successfully solved.”⁵⁵ Again, there was no definition of the term “successfully resolved.”

May 1, 2005 Regulations

In January 2005, the State Council promulgated a revised edition of the original Regulations on Letters and Visits.⁵⁶ The new regulations came into effect on May 1, 2005, and superseded the 1995 regulations.⁵⁷ They state that they are “formulated for the purposes of enhancing relations between the people’s governments at all levels and the people, protecting the lawful rights and interests of letter-writers and visitors, and maintaining a good order in letter-writing and visiting.”⁵⁸ 

Much of the language in the May 2005 regulations concerns the duties of petition officials in transferring petitions to the correct department, receiving petitions from other departments and explaining to petitioners that they ought to present their petitions to the appropriate department. The regulations include more specific time limits on the processing of petitions.

They also include more specific rules on the behavior of petitioners. To stop them from jumping around the system, petitioners are allowed to write letters or visit petitioning bureaus only at the relevant level or the next higher level.⁵⁹ Petitioners are also allowed just two appeals to higher bodies, after which their petitions are no longer to be accepted if the ensuing petitions are based on “the same facts and reasons.”⁶⁰ State organs are instructed to reject petitions which have been accepted or are currently being handled by other, lower level organs.⁶¹ As in the 1995 regulations, the 2005 revision states that petitions that are being or will be “handled according to law through litigation, arbitration, administrative reconsideration or other statutory means” ought to be transferred to the relevant organs, but it is not clear what the “relevant” organ is.⁶²

To address weaknesses in the system, the revised regulations state that one can receive administrative sanctions for “shifting responsibility onto another organ, taking a perfunctory attitude or delaying handling” of petitions.⁶³ However, the 1995 regulations used almost exactly the same language and the practice nevertheless persisted, making it unclear why petitioners should expect a different outcome under the new regulations.⁶⁴

While both the 1995 and the 2005 regulations state that “no organization or individual” may retaliate against petitioners, the new regulations are somewhat stricter. The 1995 version, while prohibiting the “suppression” or “persecution” of petitioners, did not specify what if any actions could be taken against those who broke the regulation.⁶⁵ The newer regulations state:

Whoever retaliates against a letter-writer or visitor, thus constituting a crime, should be investigated for criminal liability according to the regulation; if the act is not severe enough to constitute a crime, he should be given an administrative or disciplinary sanction according to the regulation.⁶⁶

The 2005 regulations also include possible sanctions or punishment against officials who overstep or abuse power, do nothing, refuse to execute decisions,⁶⁷ refuse to accept petitions “which fall within the scope of [the office’s] statutory functions and powers, fail to inform petitioners of the status of their inquiry within given time limits,⁶⁸ fail to support the request which is based on clear facts and conform to relevant laws, regulations, rules and other provisions, or are rude in their style of work.⁶⁹

At the same time, the new regulations add several articles restricting activism by petitioners. Petitioners “shall not harm the interests of the State, society or the collective, infringe upon the lawful rights of other citizens” or “stay and make trouble at the reception place for letters and visits.”⁷⁰ Furthermore, the 2005 regulations state in two separate articles that petitioners may not engage in illegal assembly.⁷¹ It is also now explicitly illegal to “incite, collude with, coerce or entice with money or things of value others to write letters or make visits.”⁷² While the regulations allow collective complaints, it is unclear whether this provision is an attempt to undermine this right or to create a trap door for unpopular group complainants. It should be clarified.

Another problem with the regulations is that they do not state that their purpose is to ensure the impartial treatment of cases and petitioners. This is particularly important in a system in which there is often little separation between the ruling party and the government. The regulations do not address conflicts of interest inherent in the Chinese administrative system and fail to clarify which body is responsible for enforcing decisions. 

National regulations often differ slightly from provincial and local petition regulations. For example, the Beijing Municipal Regulations on Letters and Visits states that those who “continue without reason” to petition should be prevented from “pestering” the office,⁷³ though it is unclear which steps should be taken to do so. Although group petitioning is recognized, if a group of petitioners refuses to elect five representatives as required by the regulation and continues to petition en masse, the petitions office may call the work unit to which the petitioners belong and request that they come to take the petitioners back. This provides a legal justification for the “retrievers.” ⁷⁴

Case Study: “I’ll stop petitioning when I die”

Mr. Jiang, a short but muscular Shanxi farmer, enters the room on crutches, moving slowly, his left leg hanging limp. His petite and round-faced wife assists with his crutches as he sits down. They shyly wait to speak, sitting a bit back from the group. After another petitioner describes a reeducation through labor camp, Mr. Jiang interjects, “We also went to reeducation through labor––both of us.”

 

Mr. and Mrs. Jiang’s saga began when they alleged that officials in their village stole 540,000 RMB [U.S.$66,000] through graft. Mr. Jiang told Human Rights Watch what happened next:

At 8:00 p.m. on the evening of December 30, the electric and phone lines in my house were cut. The village deputy [Communist] Party secretary brought the [thugs] on his motorcycle to my house. The vice secretary was just waiting outside on the motorcycle until the men beat me to a pulp to take him home. He [the vice secretary] gave the men 10,000 yuan [U.S.$1,200] to beat me to death. The village deputy secretary paid him to kill me. They organized it that day over lunch.

[The thugs] came into my home and hit me in the leg with a metal pipe, about this thick [16 cm]. The first blow they struck broke my leg. They tried to hit me [in the head] again and missed, but they hit me on the shoulder. Then he thought I was dead, but I wasn’t dead. I grabbed his legs, he fell over and my wife jumped on top of him. So they ran away.

“I was protecting him,” said Mrs. Jiang, smiling. 

As a result of the attack, Mr. Jiang lost the use of his left leg. He filed complaints against ten men, including the deputy secretary. Four men were charged and convicted for conspiracy and for the assault, but their sentences were not carried out:

It was a phony sentence. They gave me the paper and everything, but it was all fake. There was a trial, and I saw them take [the village Party deputy secretary] away. But they just sent the village Party secretary and the deputy secretary to another village. They have the same jobs. They’re still in power!

The Jiangs made their first trip to Beijing in 1998. In January 2003, Mr. Jiang was seized byShanxi police, who took him forcibly back to Shanxi. They handcuffed him for thirty-one hours straight while they were bringing him back, and held him for twenty days in a detention center before sentencing him to two years in a reeducation through labor camp.  Asked if inmates got Sundays off to rest, Mr. Jiang exclaims:

Sunday? What Sunday?! There are no Sundays in labor camp! Don’t even ask – they made you work every day. Sometimes we had to work through the night if there was a lot of work.

While her husband was in the labor camp, Mrs. Jiang continued to petition on his behalf in Beijing, raising concerns about his detention as well as about the original assassination attempt. Shanxi police seized her in Beijing in August 2003 and took her back to Shanxi, where she was sentenced to a year in a women’s reeducation through labor camp. She explains:

They came to Beijing just to find me. They took me to the police lock-up for fourteen days. Then I went to the reeducation through labor camp. I cooked and made beds for the other women. I was only twenty kilometers away from my husband, but I wasn’t allowed to see him.

They hit women in there. They’d hit us and wait for us to recover, and just hit us again. 

When I got out, I couldn’t come back to Beijing because my husband was sick [after his time in detention]. But as soon as he got out of the hospital, I came back to Beijing. 

Mr. and Mrs. Jiang have eight children: two are grown up, and the others range in age from six to sixteen. On their first trips to petition in Beijing, they brought their children along. Then local authorities took custody of the children, and now keep them in the village, charging Mr. and Mrs. Jiang fees to pay for a caretaker. Mr. Jiang says:

They’re keeping our kids, they’re controlling them. We’re allowed to see them, but we can’t take them away.

The authorities still want to reeducate me. They say, ‘if you do this again, if you complain again, we’ll reeducate you again.’ But how can I not complain? I’ll stop petitioning when I die, but I’m not dead yet.⁷⁵

[22] For more on petitioning and related subjects, see, for example, Carl F. Minzner, “Xinfang: An Alternative to the Formal Chinese Legal System,” Stanford Journal of International Law, vol. 42:1 (2006), (publication pending); See also Liao Yiwu, Zhongguo shangfang cun (“Shantytown for Supplicants: Reports on China's Victims of Injustices”), (Hong Kong: Mirror Books, 2005); as well as Chen Guidi and Chun Tao, An Investigation of China’s Peasantry (Zhongguo Nongmin Diaocha) [People’s Culture Press (Renmin Wenxue Chubanshe), 2004]; See also Kevin O’Brien, “The Politics of Lodging Complaints in Rural China,” China Quarterly (1995), http://www.polisci.berkeley.edu/faculty/bio/permanent/Obrien,k/CQ1995.pd..., as well as O’Brien’s work on popular protest ,of which petitioning is a part, at http://www.polisci.berkeley.edu/faculty/bio/permanent/Obrien,k/.

[23] Jonathan K. Ocko, “I’ll take it all the way to Beijing: Capital appeals in the Qing,” Journal of Asian Studies, vol. 47.2 (May 1988), p. 294.

[24] Carl F. Minzner, “Xinfang: An Alternative to the Formal Chinese Legal System,” Stanford Journal of International Law, vol. 42:1 (2006), (publication pending).

[25] Congressional-Executive Commission on China, “Annual Report 2004 of the One Hundred Eighth Congress, Second Session”, October 5, 2004 [online], http://www.cecc.gov/pages/annualRpt/annualRpt04/CECCannRpt2004.pdf?PHPSE... (retrieved November 24, 2005), p 72.

[26] Laura Luehrmann, “Facing Citizen Complaints in China, 1951-1996," Asian Survey, vol. 43:5 (October 2003), p. 849.

[27] Article 6, Regulations on Letters and Visits, 2005 [Xinfang tiaoli]. Official English translation. State Council Order No. 431. Adopted January 5, 2005, effective May 1, 2005. Beijing: China Legal Publishing House, 2005)

[28] Ibid.

[29] Minzner, “Xinfang: An Alternative to the Formal Chinese Legal System,” Stanford Journal of International Law, (publication pending).

[30] Article 21(1), Regulations on Letters and Visits, 2005 [Xinfang tiaoli].

[31] Ibid., Article 21(4).

[32] Ibid., Article 31.

[33] Ibid., Article 26.

[34] Ibid., Article 33.

[35] Minzner, “Xinfang: An Alternative to the Formal Chinese Legal System,” Stanford Journal of International Law, (publication pending); Nanping Liu, “A Vulnerable Justice: Finality of Civil Judgments in China,” Journal of Asian Law, vol. 13 (1999), p. 35-98.

[36] Contact information for the Central Government and Beijing City Xinfang Bureaus retrieved on November 9, 2004 from http://www1.cei.gov.cn/serve/doccopy/wnjgml/b/ba/010/bad/bad001/htm, as quoted in Minzner’s “Xinfang: An Alternative to the Formal Chinese Legal System,” Stanford Journal of International Law, (publication pending).

[37] Jianrong, "Xinfang Zhidu Pipan (Critique of the Petition System)."

[38] Article 18, Regulations on Letters and Visits, 2005 [Xinfang tiaoli].

[39] Human Rights Watch interview with Bai, Beijing, 2005.

[40] Ibid.

[41] Human Rights Watch interview with Zhou, Beijing, 2005.

[42] Human Rights Watch interviews with Qi, Mao, Ming, Kang, Qing, and Ou, Beijing, 2005; documents gathered from Yuan and Tang, Beijing 2004.

[43] Human Rights Watch interview with Cai, Beijing, 2005.

[44] Human Rights Watch interview with Cai, Beijing, 2005.

[45] Human Rights Watch interview with Ming, Beijing, 2005.

[46] Human Rights Watch interview with Mao, Beijing, 2005.

[47] Hu Feng and Jiang Shu, “Xinfang gongpeng [The pinnacle of petitioning],” Oriental Outlook, December 11, 2003, pp. 30-35; p. 31.

[48] Human Rights Watch interviews with Qing, Pei, Beijing, 2005.

[49] Leslie Eaton, “Coping: Up the courthouse steps, and still climbing,” New York Times, August 14, 2005, Section 14, page 1.

[50] Human Rights Watch interview with Zhou, Chinese lawyer, Beijing, 2005.

[51] Recent limited reforms of the household registration system (hukou) have eliminated certain classifications of laborers. These changes will apply largely to migrant workers, and are unlikely to affect the majority of petitioners.

[52] Jianrong, "Xinfang Zhidu Pipan (Critique of the Petition System).

[53] “Quanguo xinfang gongzuo zuotanhui zai jing zhaokai, wang gang, hua jianmin jianghua (National Letters and Visits Work Discussion Session Opens in Beijing)”, Xinhua News Agency, May 13, 2004 [online], http://news.xinhuanet.com/newscenter/2004/05/14/content_1468295.htm (retrieved November 26, 2005).

[54] “Chinese police heard 47,711 petitioners in 11 days”, People’s Daily Online, May 31, 2005 [online], http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/200505/31/print20050531_187771.html (retrieved November 24, 2005).

[55] “Police heads ordered to well handle petitioners”, People’s Daily Online, July 23, 3005 [online], http://english1.peopledaily.com.cn/200507/23/print20050723_197811.html (retrieved November 24, 2005).

[56] Regulations on Letters and Visits, 2005 [Xinfang tiaoli]. Official English translation. State Council Order No. 431. Adopted January 5, 2005, effective May 1, 2005. Beijing: China Legal Publishing House, 2005)

[57] Regulations on Handling Complaints, 1995 [Xinfang tiaoli]. State Council Decree No. 185. Promulgated on October 30, 1995, [online] http://wwww.tjutcm.edu.cn/html/dangzheng/jijian/Article_Show.asp?Article... (retrieved November 24, 2005).

[58] Article 1, Regulations on Letters and Visits, 2005 [Xinfang tiaoli].

[59] Ibid., Article 16.

[60]Ibid., Articles 34 and 35.

[61] Ibid., Article 16.

[62] Ibid., Article 14.

[63] Ibid., Article 43(1).

[64] Regulations on Handling Complaints, 1995 [Xinfang tiaoli].

[65] Ibid.

[66] Article 46, Regulations on Letters and Visits, 2005 [Xinfang tiaoli]. Interestingly, petitioners who do an especially outstanding job of petitioning and thereby make “contributions to the national economic and social development, to the improvement of the work of State organs and the protection of public interests” can receive an award. (Article 8, Regulations on Letters and Visits, 2005 [Xinfang tiaoli].

[67] Articles 40(1), 40(2), and 40(3), Regulations on Letters and Visits, 2005 [Xinfang tiaoli].

[68] Ibid., Articles 42(2) and 42(3).

[69] Ibid., Articles 43 and 44.

[70] Ibid., Article 20.

[71] Ibid., Articles 20 and 47.

[72] Ibid., Article 20.

[73]  Article 24, Beijing Municipal Regulations on Letters and Visits. Promulgated on September 8, 1994, [online] http://www.gjxfj.gov.cn/2005-01/13/content_3560795.htm (retrieved November 24, 2005).

[74] Article 25, Beijing Municipal Regulations on Letters and Visits.

[75] Human Rights Watch interview with Mr. and Mrs. Jiang, Beijing, 2005.

IV. Abuses against Petitioners at the Local Level

The petitioners interviewed for this report told Human Rights Watch of long and arduous journeys in which they sought redress for abuses by local officials. Many of their five, ten or fifteen-year journeys on the petitioning path that led them to Beijing began when they decided to take a stand against some village or township official. 

Facing down threats of violence and retaliation, these petitioners said, they took their appeals to police, the courts, and other government bureaus, but failed to obtain results. Pursuing their appeals up the hierarchy, some spent all their own and their extended families’ savings, and suffered beatings and detentions by police and thugs hired by local officials who aimed to deter them. Each abuse was cause for a new petition; for a few, the original injustice was gradually buried in the series of abuses that followed it. “We have no hope, we are in despair, but we will continue to petition,” said the mother of a young man who died in police custody.⁷⁶

This report focuses largely on what happens to petitioners after they arrive in Beijing. But much more petitioning actually happens at the provincial level, and can lead to a series of violations of due process and retaliatory attacks that drives petitioners to take their complaints to the national capital. This section surveys some of the incidents that start them on their long journeys.

The growing numbers of petitioners in Beijing are an indicator of problems with the lack of official accountability at the local level in China. In the landmark 2004 survey by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) in 2004, CASS surveyed 632 petitioners and reported that 84.5 percent of those interviewed began by petitioning about cadre corruption; 69.6 percent about village governments using excessive force to exact fees and taxes; 67.5 percent about election fraud resulting in the infringement of people’s democratic rights; 73.2 percent about land appropriation by the government; and 56.2 percent about the beating or arrest of petitioner activists by the government (multiple reasons for writing petitions were allowed).⁷⁷

 

All the petitioners we interviewed had attempted to pursue their cases at the local and provincial levels, either through complaints procedures or through the court systems. They reported that their cases were mishandled, refused by the courts, or that if decisions were made in their favor, they were not enforced. Ultimately, all said they believed they had no other recourse but to take their complaints to Beijing.

The cases documented by Human Rights Watch fell into the following categories:

• Police abuse and official violence, including threats, beatings, or murders coordinated by local officials;
• Official corruption, including fraudulent investment schemes, embezzlement, graft, and illegal taxation;
• Urban forced evictions and rural forced resettlement by officials in league with developers;
• Failure of the courts and other dispute resolution mechanisms; and
• Retaliation and reprisals by local officials.

Police Abuse and Other Official Violence

Most of the petitioners who spoke with Human Rights Watch reported abuses by the local police, including torture and beatings.⁷⁸ In some cases these abuses were the reason the original petition was filed. For example, a Heilongjiang petitioner reported that police tortured him to force him to sign a confession.⁷⁹ An ethnic Hui man from Ningxia said that after he was detained in Xinjiang, police incited other detainees to beat him.⁸⁰ Two unrelated couples from Shandong both began petitioning after the death of their sons in police custody.⁸¹

The belief that local police covered up crimes against them impelled a number of petitioners.⁸² For instance, a Shandong couple believe that police covered up the cause of their son’s death and did away with his body.⁸³

Some of the longest petitioning sagas begin with acts of violence that villagers alleged were orchestrated by officials in an attempt to silence them. In three cases, petitioners interviewed by Human Rights Watch alleged murders or attempted murders coordinated by village officials.⁸⁴ 

Ming, a petitioner from Shanxi who lives in the Beijing petitioners’ village with his eleven-year-old son, said that when he raised public concerns about attempts by the Party secretary of his village to take on multiple conflicting government positions, the Party secretary ordered him killed:

At 7:00 p.m. on January 31, 2002, five or six people went to my house. They brought an iron hammer. They came in and said nothing. They weren’t from our village, I’d never seen them before, they were thugs. 

First they hit my wife and my younger brother’s wife in the head with an iron hammer. They were coming for me, but they didn’t know who they were dealing with. My brother hit [one attacker] over the head with a chair, and then when the chair broke he beat him to death with the chair leg….

The kids were crying, they were terrified. This boy here was especially frightened, he was clinging to the door and crying.⁸⁵

Zhang said that despite years of complaints, local police refused to investigate the case.

Similarly, Mao, a Henan man, told us that his petition began in 1999 after the village Party deputy secretary had his father murdered. Mao’s father had been petitioning for nineteen years over a land claim. According to Mao:

They killed him with a hoe, they hit him in the back of the head. They also hit my mother and my sister. My sister fought back, and killed the attacker. So she was sentenced to five years in prison. This was all arranged by the village deputy Party secretary. I thought this was not fair treatment for my sister, so I’ve been petitioning for many years.⁸⁶

Mao said that as a result of his petitioning activities, he had also experienced multiple detentions and beatings.

In recent years, senior Chinese officials have acknowledged that police misconduct is a widespread problem, and in some areas police have been fired en masse for persistent reports of torture or corruption. In January 2004, official media announced that nearly 35,000 police had been fired: nearly 11,000 for “sub-standard work,” and 34,000 others for lack of proper credentials.⁸⁷ In May 2004, the Ministry of Public Security announced a year-long plan to reopen all reported cases of abuse. The investigation was to be conducted by the Supreme People’s Procuratorate in Beijing and was to include five types of crimes, including dereliction of duty causing great loss of people’s lives and assets, illegal investigation and detention, evidence collection through violent means, inquisition by torture and abuse of prisoners. These initiatives have successfully made the issue of ending police abuse one of national prominence, but they fall short of the systemic reforms needed to end police abuse.

Corruption

Thirty of the forty-nine petitioners whose cases were collected for this report began by petitioning about some form of official corruption.⁸⁸

The allegations of corruption cases documented by Human Rights Watch ranged from fraud by government-run businesses, as in the case of a former bank manager who claims the bank misappropriated funds and charged him with the crime;⁸⁹ to cases where petitioners allege that police were bribed to not investigate crimes against their relatives.

Some cases, such as those of victims of alleged fraudulent government investment schemes, have become mass petitions involving hundreds of petitioners. For instance, in one case, 1,500 investors, many of them senior citizens, signed letters saying that they bought plots in a Beijing cemetery that was never constructed.⁹⁰ Approximately one thousand investors are petitioning in the case of a futures firm partly owned by Li Xiaoyong, son of former premier Li Peng. The company collapsed in 1998. Investors allege that Li Xiaoyong absconded with the funds, and that government officials executed a Taiwanese owner of the firm, while covering up the role of the premier’s son.⁹¹

A Liaoning man told Human Rights Watch that after his mother was injured in a traffic accident, the responsible driver bribed police to alter photographic evidence.⁹² A Henan woman reported that police took bribes to free the men who gang-raped her.⁹³

In other cases, farmers from Henan and Hebei have petitioned to the national level about their infection with HIV through state-run blood collection centers, demanding government assistance.⁹⁴ One activist reported that in 2004 he had accompanied petitioners infected with HIV through state-run blood collection centers to file complaints more than twenty times.⁹⁵

Forced Eviction and Resettlement

Evictions in urban areas, often undertaken by force and with minimal compensation, have become a problem that affects tens of thousands of residents in Chinese cities.⁹⁶ Many farmers have also been forcibly resettled because of land seizures by officials working with developers, or to make way for large-scale infrastructure projects such as the Three Gorges Dam.⁹⁷ Some of the largest and most visible protests by petitioners in Beijing have related to forced eviction cases.

Pei, from Liaoning, said that after her family lost a lawsuit to prevent their eviction from their home, over fifty people showed up in the middle of the night with a bulldozer and knocked down the house, injuring her mother and brother who were asleep inside:

They gave us no warning at all! They just came in and did it and chased us out. All our things were demolished inside the house….My mother had a weak heart, and when it happened she had a heart attack. My brother was hit in the nose and passed out.⁹⁸

In the past three years, there have been growing conflicts between petitioners from Shanghai who were forcibly evicted from their homes and local authorities, with police arresting petitioners as they were about to get on the train to Beijing on several occasions.⁹⁹

Many petitions begin when farmland is seized by developers working with local officials. These conflicts can also escalate into violent confrontations.¹⁰⁰ Human Rights Watch met with two delegations of farmers from a town on the periphery of Beijing. The farmers, who said they represented all the residents in their village, claim that county officials illegally seized their lands and created what they said was a false contract for the lease of the lands.¹⁰¹ 

Failure of the Courts and Other Dispute Resolution Mechanisms

While in recent years there has been a great deal of discussion and even excitement in some quarters about the development of the Chinese legal system and the rule of law, the court system still does not function for the poor and less powerful members of Chinese society. The fact that the courts usually do not offer an avenue for justice––and are widely seen as a futile avenue for complaints against officials by the Chinese public––are a major reason for the proliferation of petitions. In a functional legal system, many of these cases would be directed to and resolved by the court system.

The systematic lack of fair trials in China has led to a widespread lack of faith in the court system. Some petitioners said they did not even attempt to take their cases to court because they did not believe they would get a fair hearing. As one petitioner put it, “There’s no reason in the courts, they are not reasonable there.”¹⁰²

There are three straightforward reasons why so many people choose to file petitions:

• petitions are free to file;
• there is no need for specialized legal knowledge, as anyone can write a petition, while some legal knowledge is necessary to draft a complaint to be filed with the local court; and
• petitioning gives, at least at first blush, the impression of being more time efficient.

Before coming to Beijing, all the petitioners interviewed by Human Rights Watch said they had attempted to get redress for their injuries through the local government by filing complaints with the local police bureau or by filing suit in local, county or provincial courts. All those interviewed reported frustration and disappointment with these mechanisms, which they described as flawed due to corruption and political interference by officials acting on behalf of colleagues in the Communist Party. The lack of independent mechanisms that can provide redress at the local level drives many to take their cases to Beijing. As one farmer said:

If you have money, you can put a stop to [abuse by officials], but there is no government procedure that will deal with it.¹⁰³

Several petitioners reported that courts refused to accept cases that were “too sensitive.”¹⁰⁴ A farmer from a town in Beijing municipality whose land was seized by officials said:

The local court won’t accept the case. I also went to the [municipal] Land Management Bureau because they’re in charge of this, and they said that they can sue people, but that they will not. [They said that] the local government has to take care of it, and we can’t reach them with our lawsuits.¹⁰⁵

Another petitioner said:

I looked for a lawyer, but some of them were afraid to take on the case….In China, lawyers have no power, they’re useless. Some of them have good relations with the government, and others are afraid—you open their mouth to them, and they run away.¹⁰⁶

For other petitioners who came from impoverished rural regions, the cost of hiring a lawyer was prohibitive.¹⁰⁷ While the Chinese government has established a nascent legal aid program, the Ministry of Justice acknowledges that the demand for legal aid currently far exceeds what existing legal aid centers can provide.¹⁰⁸

Despite these obstacles, some petitioners said that they had succeeded in filing suits, but that they were not satisfied with the way the courts decided their cases and believed there were political reasons for this.¹⁰⁹ For instance, one petitioner said she believed that the court decided against her—she had sued to stop authorities from forcibly evicting her from her home—as a result of pressure by Party officials with connections to real estate developers.¹¹⁰

Others believe their trials were flawed. Mr. and Mrs. Du, who sued in Shandong courts over their son’s death in police custody, said that police had made no record of their son’s death, and as his corpse had been destroyed by police, the family could present no evidence other than photographs of his battered corpse. As a result, the court dismissed the suit. Mrs. Du said:

We are Chinese people, we should be able to resolve this through our own Chinese court system, and we shouldn’t have to go to [human rights groups] outside our own country. But do you call this law? What kind of legal system is this? I don’t care about money, no amount of compensation will bring back our son’s life….I want justice.¹¹¹

Each petitioner interviewed by Human Rights Watch who had obtained a favorable court decision reported that the decision was not enforced.¹¹² Said one, “I sued all the way up, the decisions were all in my favor, and the bank acknowledged their fault…[but] none of the decisions were enforced.”¹¹³

Many petitioners expressed frustration with a court system that is subject to interference at every level by Party officials. As Chinese activist Li Jian summed up to a reporter:

The judiciary is tied up with the interests of local governments….This has two effects. One is that you’re not going to get a fair hearing. The other is that the judiciary will not act. Most of the petitioners you meet in Beijing are there because they tried to take their cases through the local courts but met with failure.¹¹⁴

           

Chinese government agencies offer other complaint mechanisms, including petitions offices at the local, county and provincial levels of government agencies. In many cases, complaint mechanisms are formalized. In rural regions, complaints may also be filed informally by visiting an official’s office and asking him to look into the case.

Several petitioners said that when they tried to report violence by local officials or the local police, the police, and procuratorates flatly refused to look into the cases. For instance, one petitioner reported that the procuratorate in Beijing, which is tasked with handling complaints of police abuse, refused to accept her complaint that Beijing police used excessive force during her arrest at a demonstration in Tiananmen Square.¹¹⁵

The most common complaint was that local government agencies took down complaints of official abuse and never acted on them. Said one longtime petitioner who reported that his family had been attacked by a thug hired by local officials:

We went to the city police, the city government, and the county police, everyone. I did it for two years and no one cared. Nothing happened.¹¹⁶

In other cases, petitioners said that one government office or official would pass the responsibility on to another one (zhuanban, or “transfer it to be managed”) indefinitely.¹¹⁷ Yu, a petitioner, said that he ultimately decided that it was hopeless to try to get one official in his town to hold another accountable:

The county mayor, the deputy mayor of the township, and the mayor of the township are all friends. That’s how [this corrupt local official] is protected. He has good connections with all of them, and there’s nothing we can do.¹¹⁸

National and local petitioning regulations commonly require petitions cases to be handled at the local level.¹¹⁹ But when the local government office is staffed by only a handful of officials, this is unlikely to lead to results. In fact, some petitioners said, the agencies with which they filed their petitions or complaints actually referred the complaint back to the official who had committed the original abuse, asking him to investigate himself. Yu, one of a group of villagers who had filed numerous complaints about an illegal land seizure by local officials and who had had this experience, told Human Rights Watch:

We have a saying, guanguan xianghu––officials take care of each other….If you complain, they will arrest you, or they will just send the case back down [to the abusive official].¹²⁰

Retaliation and Reprisals for Local Complaints

Those who complain about local abuses to other government authorities may not only be disappointed by the mishandling of the case. They then also face the risk of abuse and retaliation, including threats and beatings by police and officials who wish to silence the complainant.

A group of farmers from a village under the jurisdiction of Beijing municipality is typical in this regard. The group became embroiled in a series of complaints and retaliatory abuses that began when local officials sold their land without their consent in order to develop a fishery. Several villagers said that after one of the farmers sued to stop officials seizing her land, she disappeared:

She went home at night, and ten minutes later, her husband followed her and she was gone. There was a big rainstorm that night, and she vanished. The police took her husband away on suspicion, but they let him go….They have looked for her everywhere, and her husband is still suing, but there is nothing he can do, because there is no proof that anything happened to her.¹²¹

After further conflicts with the official who sold their land, the villagers occupied the land and blocked off the road. In return, they said, town officials hired a gang of armed thugs to frighten them off:

They were not people from our village, they were from outside, we didn’t recognize them. They brought big sticks, over one meter long each, each person had a stick….We [the villagers] called the police, and the police came, and the villagers ran away [as the police and thugs were working together]. We had tents with blankets and beds, and they tore down the tents and destroyed all the stuff that was inside them.¹²²

The villagers attempted to complain to local police, but said that police refused to follow up on the incident. The villagers then signed an open letter to higher-ranking government officials describing the incident. This in turn led to further retaliation:

We gave [the letter] to someone in the government, and he was supposed to preserve confidentiality….But he photocopied it and gave it to [the local official who was the target of the original lawsuit]. So on May 18, [one of the farmers] went to talk to the deputy mayor of the town. He admitted that photocopies had been made, but then he beat her up. She went to the hospital, we have proof. She was beaten on the shoulder, lower back and hips, and on the head.¹²³

Commented another farmer from the town in Beijing’s suburbs:

Don’t forget that this man is a Communist Party official, and he is not permitted to beat people….So we petitioned to the Beijing municipal Public Security Bureau and the Beijing municipal government.¹²⁴

However, another farmer from the same town said that raising the complaint to the level of the municipal government did not lead to a resolution either:

They just sent it back and said that the local government should handle it….They said that the place where this happens is the place where it should be dealt with.¹²⁵

A farmer from a neighboring village reported a similar case. Land was sold off without compensation, he said, and when villagers complained to higher authorities, they were threatened by thugs; police refused to register their complaint as well.¹²⁶

In other cases, petitioners told Human Rights Watch that they had been beaten by police in order to dissuade them from complaining about police abuse. Ou, a petitioner who said that her brother died in police custody, had this account:

The doctors…saw that he had bruising on the arms and around the neck. They asked the police to keep the body, but they didn’t. It disappeared. The police wouldn’t report the case of my brother’s death. They must have buried it, it couldn’t have disappeared.

My mother went to the Public Security Bureau to complain about it and they twisted and broke her arm and beat her. She was fifty-six at the time…She went to the county hospital, which said that her arm was fine. They didn’t dare to admit her. So she had to go to the local clinic where she lied about what had happened to her. She told them that she fell over. Then they fixed it. She is still in so much pain.¹²⁷

Other officials threatened other forms of retaliation. Pei, who sued to try to stop the forced eviction of her family, said:

I sued to the local court and to the county court. They decided against me, so I appealed to the district court. They threw out my appeal. My brother lived at the government work unit, and they threatened me: ‘If you don’t stop appealing, we’ll fire your brother.’¹²⁸

The May 1, 2005 regulations explicitly ban retaliation against petitioners. Article 3 of the Regulations on Letters and Visits states that, “No organization or individual may retaliate against letter-writers or visitors.”¹²⁹ Article 46 of the same regulations stipulates:

Whoever retaliates against a letter-writer or visitor, thus constituting a crime, shall be investigated for criminal liability according to law; if the act is not serious enough to constitute a crime, he shall be given an administrative or disciplinary sanction according to law.¹³⁰

The Chinese constitution also guarantees citizens the right to “criticize and make suggestions to any state organ or functionary,” and stipulates that:

No one may suppress such complaints, charges and exposures, or retaliate against the citizens making them. Citizens who have suffered losses through infringement of their civil rights by any state organ or functionary have the right to compensation in accordance with the law.¹³¹

However, from the accounts of those interviewed, it is clear that retaliation is a serious problem and that many Chinese citizens fear retaliation if they dare to report or protest against abuse. It is equally clear that the Chinese state has done little to protect its citizens from retaliation.

Because retaliation has a devastating impact on the individuals, their families, and the broader community, if an official receives credible information that any other official may have behaved in an abusive manner, it is imperative that the state arrange for a thorough investigation by an independent qualified person or office, protect the alleged victim and potential witnesses during the course of the investigation, and, if it is determined that abuse has occurred, punish the official or police officer appropriately.

[76] Human Rights Watch interview with Mrs. Du, petitioner, Beijing, 2005.

[77] Jianrong, "Xinfang Zhidu Pipan (Critique of the Petition System)."

[78] Case materials collected from Er, Shan, Zhu, Jie, Gong, Feng, Wen, Mr. and Mrs. Lee, and Mr. and Mrs. Du, Beijing, 2004.

[79] Human Rights Watch interview with Feng, Beijing, 2005.

[80] Human Rights Watch interview with Gong, Beijing, 2005.

[81] Human Rights Watch interviews with Mr. and Mrs. Gao and with Mr. and Mrs. Du, Beijing, 2005.

[82] Human Rights Watch interviews with Ren, Hu, Jiang, and Ou, Beijing, 2005; materials submitted by Xu, Yang, Ao, and Mo, Beijing, 2004.

[83] Human Rights Watch interview with Mr. and Mrs. Du, Beijing, 2005.

[84] Human Rights Watch interviews with Mao, Ming, and Mr. and Mrs. Jiang, Beijing, 2005.

[85] Human Rights Watch interview with Ming, Beijing, 2005.

[86] Human Rights Watch interview with Mao, Beijing, 2005.

[87] “China dismisses over 30,000 unqualified policemen in clean-up campaign,” Xinhua News Agency, January 7, 2004.

[88] Human Rights Watch interviews with Qing, Feng, Kang, Ren, Ming, Qi, Mao, Ai, Bao, Cai, Hua, Jiang, Ou, Pei, as well as a delegation of twelve petitioners from a village near Beijing, Beijing, 2005; also case materials collected from Tang, Bai, Chen, and Dai, Beijing 2004.

[89] Human Rights Watch interview with Li, petitioner, Beijing, 2005. Documents from his case on file at Human Rights Watch.

[90] Dossier of documents on file at Human Rights Watch include a registry of names of victims, written statements, brochures and advertisements for the cemetery, certificates and receipts for the purchase of plots, etc.

[91] “Angry Chinese protestors call on Li Peng to pay back their money,” Agence France Presse, January 16, 2002; Human Rights Watch interview with Ai and Bao, petitioners, Beijing, 2005; Human Rights Watch interview with Zhou, lawyer, Beijing, 2005.

[92] Human Rights Watch interview with Hu, Beijing, 2005.

[93] Human Rights Watch interview with Qi, Beijing, 2005.

[94] Human Rights Watch interview with Zhou, Beijing, 2005; Human Rights Watch e-mail correspondence with Song, AIDS activist, Beijing, 2005. For more on the blood scandal in Henan and elsewhere in China, see Human Rights Watch, “Locked Doors: The Human Rights of People Living with HIV/AIDS in China”, A Human Rights Watch Report, vol. 15, no. 7(C), August 2003, available at http://www.hrw.org/reports/2003/china0803/.

[95] Human Rights Watch e-mail communication with Song, 2005.

[96] For more on forced evictions, see Human Rights Watch, “Demolished: Forced Evictions and The Tenants’ Rights Movement In China”, A Human Rights Watch Report, vol. 16, no. 4(C), March 2004, available at http://hrw.org/reports/2004/china0304/.

[97] For more on forced resettlement for the Three Gorges Dam, see Human Rights Watch / Asia, “The Three Gorges Dam in China: Forced resettlement, suppression of dissent, and labor rights concerns”, A Human Rights Watch Report, vol. 7, no. 2, February 1995, available at http://hrw.org/summaries/s.china952.html.

[98] Human Rights Watch interview with Pei, Beijing, 2005. For more on the problem of forced evictions in urban China, see Human Rights Watch, “Demolished: Forced Evictions and The Tenants’ Rights Movement In China”, A Human Rights Watch Report, vol. 16, no. 4(C), March 2004, available at http://hrw.org/reports/2004/china0304/.

[99] “Retaliatory detentions of Shanghai petitioners,” Human Rights in China, July 19, 2005 [online], http://www.hrichina.org/public/contents/press?revision%5fid=23671&item%5... (retrieved November 25, 2005); “Petitioners protest attempted prosecution,” Human Rights in China, June 28, 2005 [online], http://www.hrichina.org/public/contents/press?revision%5fid=23294&item%5... (retrieved November 25, 2005; “Petitioners assaulted as police discourage Beijing influx,” Human Rights in China, June 27, 2005 [online], http://www.hrichina.org/public/contents/press?revision%5fid=23228&item%5... (retrieved November 25, 2005); see also Human Rights Watch, “Demolished: Forced Evictions and The Tenants’ Rights Movement In China”, A Human Rights Watch Report, vol. 16, no. 4(C), March 2004, available at http://hrw.org/reports/2004/china0304/.

[100] Human Rights Watch interview with Feng, Mao, Beijing, 2005; materials submitted by Dai, Beijing, 2004.

[101] Human Rights Watch interviews with twelve farmers, Beijing, 2005.

[102] Human Rights Watch interview with Cai, Beijing, 2005.

[103] Human Rights Watch interview with Yu, Beijing, 2005.

[104] Human Rights Watch interviews with Hua, Yuan, Pei, Bao and Ai, Beijing, 2005.

[105] Human Rights Watch interview with Yu, Beijing, 2005.

[106] Human Rights Watch interview with Hua, Beijing, 2005.

[107] Human Rights Watch interview with Cai, Beijing, 2005.

[108] According to China’s Ministry of Justice, “It is estimated that more 700,000 cases need legal aid every year in our country, but actually less than one fourth have got aid. The other [difficulty] is the severe shortage of legal aid fund. Legal aid fund appropriated by the state for each person is less than 6 cents each year, which is far below the average level of the developing countries. ”Ministry of Justice of the People’s Republic of China, “Survey on Chinese Legal Aid System” [online], http://www.legalinfo.gov.cn/english/LegalAid/LegalAid1.htm (retrieved July 23, 2005).

[109] Human Rights Watch interviews with Hua, Pei, and Ren, Beijing, 2005.

[110] Human Rights Watch interview with Pei, Beijing, 2005.

[111] Human Rights Watch interview with Mrs. Du, Beijing, 2005.

[112] Human Rights Watch interviews with Qi, Jiang and Qing, Beijing, 2005.

[113] Human Rights Watch interview with Qing, Beijing, 2005.

[114] “China charges petitioner who tried to march on Tiananmen Square,” Radio Free Asia, June 24, 2005 [online], http://www.rfa.org/english/news/social/2005/06/24/china_charge/ (retrieved July 22, 2005).

[115] Human Rights Watch interview with Ai, Beijing, 2005.

[116] Human Rights Watch interview with Ming, Beijing, 2005.

[117] Human Rights Watch interviews with Yu, Jiang, Ming, Beijing, 2005.

[118] Human Rights Watch interview with Yu, Beijing, 2005.

[119] Minzner, “Xinfang: An Alternative to the Formal Chinese Legal System,” Stanford Journal of International Law, (publication pending).

[120] Human Rights Watch interview with Yu, Beijing, 2005.

[121] Human Rights Watch interview with Wang, Beijing, 2005.

[122] Human Rights Watch interview with Yu, Beijing, 2005.

[123] Human Rights Watch interview with Rong, Beijing, 2005.

[124] Human Rights Watch interview with Wang, Beijing, 2005.

[125] Human Rights Watch interview with Yu, Beijing, 2005.

[126] Human Rights Watch interview with Ya, Beijing, 2005.

[127] Human Rights Watch interview with Ou, Beijing, 2005.

[128] Human Rights Watch interview with Pei, Beijing, 2005. A “work unit” or danwei is a government compound comprising the offices of a certain department and apartments for staff who work in that office.

[129] Article 3, Regulations on Letters and Visits, 2005 [Xinfang tiaoli].

[130] Ibid., Article 46.

[131] Article 41, “Constitution of the People’s Republic of China (Adopted on December 4, 1982)”, China.org.cn, [online] http://www.china.org.cn/english/features/89012.htm (retrieved November 25, 2005).

V. Abuses Against Petitioners in Beijing

 

The lack of the right to redress, the endemic problems of corruption and conflicts of interest in local governments, and the real threat of retaliation against complainants drive many petitioners to take their cases to Beijing. Once they reach Beijing––usually at great effort and expense––petitioners often face serious abuses. 

In response to the lack of redress, growing numbers of petitioners have mounted protests in Beijing. Petitioners prominent in Beijing protests have been imprisoned, sometimes simply for applying for protest permits. Many other petitioners live in a petitioners’ village in Beijing, a squalid shantytown where they lack access to basic medical care and education for their children.

While the regulations adopted on May 1, 2005 specifically prohibit retaliation, petitioners report that security personnel have continued to attack and detain them since that date. Provincial authorities send security officers to Beijing to seize petitioners often by force, or to frighten them away from exercising their legal right to petition. Petitioners report that Beijing police ignore these violent assaults. In some cases they actually turn petitioners over to provincial security officers to be arrested.

Once detained, many petitioners are simply taken back to their home province and released. However, some are detained without trial in local prisons or in reeducation through labor camps. Some petitioners who are taken home also face the risk of violent retaliation there.

This kind of retaliation against petitioners is widespread and systematic, and is conducted with the awareness and even the passive participation of Beijing security personnel. The problem is also well-documented in China: According to the CASS survey in 2004, over 50 percent of petitioners had been beaten by an official, over 40 percent had family members who had been beaten by officials, over 53 percent had been beaten by thugs hired by officials, and over 50 percent had been detained or imprisoned. Nineteen percent had been sentenced to reeducation through labor.¹³²

While the new regulations aim to end retaliation, the system of provincial responsibility for petitioners in Beijing encourages retaliation. Despite the new regulations, there have been no reports of efforts by Beijing authorities to investigate retaliation against petitioners when it happens in Beijing, or to hold provincial authorities accountable for retaliation. Rather, petitioners told Human Rights Watch that Beijing police refused to answer calls to the police emergency line by petitioners or to intervene when they saw provincial security officers beating or detaining petitioners.

China’s government, while increasingly decentralized, is still a unitary and hierarchical system. Decisions about provincial resources are largely made in Beijing, and directives or statements issued by central government or Party authorities still, at least formally, have the force of law. Provincial Party secretaries, who wield power comparable to or greater than that of provincial governors, are appointed and dismissed on the orders of authorities in Beijing.

In an effort to press local officials to resolve cases at the local level, provincial and national authorities have passed stringent rules that mete out punishments to officials from regions where there are many petitioners. Authorities from regions with large numbers of petitioners who travel to Beijing face official criticism and suspension. Some provinces impose disciplinary measures on officials who govern regions from which there are any petitioners at all.¹³³ During especially sensitive periods, such as major holidays or national political conferences (the 2008 Olympics will be one of these), Beijing police issue circulars ordering provincial and local authorities to handle all petitioning matters in order to ensure that there are no petitioners from their regions in Beijing.¹³⁴ This system creates an incentive for provincial authorities to threaten and detain petitioners in order to preserve both the reputations of their provinces and their own individual careers.

Because national authorities have so much power over the careers of provincial authorities, provincial and local officials often detain, beat, and intimidate petitioners in order to protect themselves from criticism by their superiors.

A. The “Retrievers”

                In Beijing, retrievers (jiefang renyuan) wait across the street from petitions offices to         forcibly return petitioners home.

                © 2005 Private

Petitioners told Human Rights Watch that provincial and local authorities send “retrievers” [jiefang renyuan] to Beijing to either discourage people from their province from petitioning, or to detain them and bring them back. ¹³⁵ In many cases, arrests are conducted with the assistance of Beijing police. These arrests are often carried out with violence. After they are taken back to the home province, many petitioners are arbitrarily detained without trial in facilities where they face the risk of torture and the certainty of lengthy sentences of forced labor.

Most petitioners who spoke to Human Rights Watch said that while a few retrievers who detained them wore police uniforms, the majority wore street clothes and did not identify themselves, perhaps in order to avoid jurisdictional conflicts with Beijing police or to prevent petitioners filing complaints about police abuse. Many Chinese police bureaus hire untrained civilians to assist in police work.¹³⁶ Activists familiar with the issue, however, said that most retrievers were probably police officers in plain clothes.¹³⁷ One petitioner told Human Rights Watch:

Both times that I got beaten up it was by people wearing street clothes. I recognized them [as police officers] both times, [and I asked them], ‘Why are you taking me?’ They said, ‘To stop you petitioning. We’ll resolve your problem.’¹³⁸

Some petitioners said that their provinces’ retrievers worked out of either guesthouses or the Beijing offices of provincial governments, and were rotated through Beijing for a month at a time.¹³⁹

In some cases, retrievers approached petitioners quietly, promising petitioners that if they left quietly, the retrievers would help in resolving their cases at the local level.¹⁴⁰ In other cases, they offered bribes or other incentives.¹⁴¹ A Liaoning petitioner said he was offered a bribe to stop petitioning:

The director of the Legal Committee came to talk to me. He said, ‘About this matter of yours, we’ll give you 50,000 RMB [U.S.$6,120].’

I said, ‘What money is this, where does it come from?’

He said, ‘It’s from the Public Security Bureau.’

I said, ‘Can I take this as an acknowledgement that they were in the wrong?’

He said, ‘We’ll just give you the money, and then you can stop petitioning.’

I said, ‘I won’t take your money. You need to admit you were wrong.’¹⁴²

However, petitioners say they are more often beaten than bribed.

Petitioners report that retrievers not only use violence and excessive force in the process of detaining them, but that they also lie in wait and use violence and threats to frighten petitioners away from even approaching government offices. Retrievers wait on the steps in front of government offices where petitioners submit their complaints, such as the National Office of Letters and Visits, the State Council, the Supreme Court, and others. Petitioners said that retrievers listened for the accents of their home provinces to identify them, or approached petitioners to ask which province they were from. On one occasion, a couple who attempted to petition said they were intercepted by retrievers from their province who promised to help translate from their local dialect into Mandarin; instead, the retrievers detained and beat them.¹⁴³

More commonly, petitioners reported that retrievers asked which province they were from and then simply began to beat them.¹⁴⁴ Several petitioners reported being ambushed by gangs of retrievers from their province outside of government offices. Mr. and Mrs. Lee, a rural couple in their sixties, reported a typical instance. As they walked down the street toward the State Council petitions office,

Thirty to forty people surrounded us and asked us where we were from. Before we even opened our mouths, they started to hit us. Over twenty people began hitting my husband. They stomped his body here [indicating left ribs]….They knocked me down, too. Every time I’d try to get up, they’d kick me back down. This happened three or four times. It was raining, and my poncho was soaked with water.¹⁴⁵

Beatings are said to be especially common in the run-up to or during major political conferences. Hua, a Liaoning petitioner, said:

Many people have been beaten. Once I saw a guy being beaten by four people, and he was trying to crawl away….This was right before the Two Meetings. They were all wearing street clothes, or uniforms that they had pulled off the IDs and markers on their epaulets.¹⁴⁶

In unusual instances, retrievers actually beat petitioners inside national government offices, while security guards look on. Hua recalled:

I was at the central Office of Letters and Visits, and I went up to the Liaoning window. Strangely, I noticed that all the petitioners were standing around and were afraid to go up to the window…so I went up, and they shut the window. Three people were standing there and they saw my materials. 

One of the three people asked me where I was from. I said, ‘Where are you from? Who are you?’ If you want information from me, you should give it first, right? The person dressed in plain clothes said, ‘I’m a policeman.’ Then these three people started hitting me. They hit me on the head, the body, the legs, they used their hands to hit me. There was no confidentiality in that office.¹⁴⁷ 

Another petitioner reported being beaten and threatened in Beijing by thugs sent from his home province, Heilongjiang:

I and another person were staying in the basement of the Chaoyang hospital. In the middle of the night on June 2, 2004, five people burst into the room where we were staying and attacked us. We were beaten. They stole our belongings, including 350 RMB [U.S.$43], and told us, ‘We’re going to kill you—stop petitioning.’¹⁴⁸

Often, petitioners say, retrievers use force to get petitioners into cars and drive them back to the home province. Some said they were simply driven back to the home province, or given bus tickets to return.¹⁴⁹ Many immediately return to Beijing to continue petitioning, as one petitioner explained:

I’ve been arrested twice since I got to Beijing….Each time, they held me for fifteen days and then sent me back to Ningxia….Each time, I just come back to Beijing—what else can I do?¹⁵⁰

The use of excessive force in the process of arrest violates Chinese law. Article 22 of China’s police law prohibits the inflicting of “bodily punishment” by police.¹⁵¹ International standards are more specific: the U.N. Code of Conduct for Law Enforcement Officials stipulates that “law enforcement officials may use force only when strictly necessary and to the extent required for the performance of their duty.”¹⁵²

The beatings and abuse described by petitioners fail both Chinese and international standards, and also constitute torture or cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment under international law, including the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which China is a signatory, and the U.N. Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, to which China is a party.¹⁵³

For some, the cycle of retaliation and petitioning has continued for so long that they have begun to fear for their lives. A Henan petitioner said:

They’ve sent me back to Henan more than ten times, but I keep coming back. This problem has never been resolved, and I don’t dare to meet with the local government anymore. I almost never even leave the petitioners’ village, I only came out to meet with you. I can’t do anything anymore.¹⁵⁴

The Impact of the May 1 Regulations

In the weeks leading up to May 1, 2005, police cracked down on petitioners, detaining hundreds in Beijing and Shanghai.¹⁵⁵ After promulgating new regulations on May 1, the Ministry of Public Security issued public statements calling on police to resolve petitioners’ cases at the local level and reported that many had done so. Petitioners interviewed for this report, however, said that the new regulations did not improve their situation and reports indicate that crackdowns against petitioners in Beijing and Shanghai have continued.

For example, during the Human Rights Watch research trip to Beijing, which took place after the regulations had gone into effect, police rounded up a group of over three hundred petitioners gathered in front of the Communist Party Discipline Committee and took them to the Majia building. According to one of the detainees, police sorted detainees by province. They told the detained petitioners that retrievers from their provinces would come to pick them up, but instead released them after twenty-four hours.¹⁵⁶

Petitioners reported that retrievers did not leave Beijing after May 1. Instead, they simply found new perches across the street from the gates to government offices. As Cai, a petitioner, said:

There are actually more retrievers now than there used to be. They used to all stand at the gates. But there’s a big street, and alleys off to the side. They just moved across the street and stand on the sides.¹⁵⁷

 

Another petitioner confirmed this:

Since May 1…[the retrievers] are not near the gates, they park farther away, scattered all over the place. Mostly they are on Yongdingmen [Road] opposite from the two [main] petitions offices…. They try to trick people now. They say, ‘Come back home, we’ll sort it all out.’ But how can they sort it out? We are complaining about them, they are the source of the problem. How can they resolve it?¹⁵⁸

The photograph, taken after May 1, 2005, shows retrievers sitting across the street from lines of petitioners waiting to enter government offices.

Petitioners who spoke to Human Rights Watch generally expressed skepticism with the new regulations. Mrs. Lee commented, “The new law…has no effect on the retrievers at all. It has nothing to do with them.”¹⁵⁹

Case Study: “They did all this to keep me from petitioning”

Ms. Kang, a rural woman from Jilin province, walks with crutches because she lost the use of her feet beaten by police. She is forty-eight years old, and her long hair, streaked with grey, is pulled back in a ponytail. She is soft-spoken, with a gentle smile.

A friend explains that her case began when her husband, injured in a state-run factory, was unable to collect promised workers’ compensation. Alleging official corruption in management of the factory, Ms. Kang began to petition, and eventually took her complaint to Beijing. In 2002 she was seized there and taken back to Jilin:

[In Jilin], I spent sixteen days in the detention house. They shackled me to a chair by my hands and feet. I couldn’t move at all. Everything was swollen, my hands, my feet. Everything became numb. They beat me and I couldn’t take it. It was so hard. After sixteen days, I was sentenced to reeducation through labor for one year. It was the first month of the lunar new year [roughly, February 2002]….

I was beaten in there four times because I wouldn’t eat. I’m a vegetarian so I don’t eat meat…

After I left, I continued to complain. I went home and my daughter was with the police. I had to write and then they let her go.

I went back to Beijing and complained again….I was trying to block [Premier] Zhu Rongji’s car and give him my petition. The policemen grabbed me….At the station they wrestled me down and put my arms behind my back. I screamed, ‘Help me! Help me!’ but no one cared. Everyone there is paid off…

They sent me back to labor camp for three years….When I woke up I was in the Liaoyuan women’s reeducation through labor camp. My clothes had been cut off with a knife, and they had cut my hair.

[In labor camp], they wouldn’t give you time to do anything….I slept on the fourth floor and worked on the third floor….We had to go up the stairs and down the hall and then back downstairs to get to the dining hall to eat. But they would only give us twenty-five minutes, and if you were late they would beat you. My legs didn’t work anymore, and so I had to crawl and drag myself all the way up and all the way back down again.

I am a vegetarian and I don’t eat meat, so I went on hunger strike. On the tenth day of the hunger strike, they said they were afraid I would die. They sent me to the hospital….In the hospital, they put me in a room and covered all the windows so I didn’t know where I was. I couldn’t see anything….They strapped me to a bare bed frame for two to three days. They put shackles on my hands and feet. I would lose consciousness and wake up and look at my hands and feet, and they were so big and red….The bed was too small, and it was metal, so it was up against the top of my head. I couldn’t take it.

If you moved, the feeding tube would move and you would start to throw up. It was very painful….My throat got swollen to the point where they couldn’t insert the feeding tube. They eventually did insert it, though, at which point it cut me and I started vomiting. They did all of this to keep me from petitioning….

There was this boy there, barely graduated from the police academy, and he wanted me to die. I asked him to give me the newspaper he was reading. He just said, ‘Do you know where you are? You are here to be punished.’

Eventually, Ms. Kang’s health deteriorated to the point where her family was notified that she likely was going to die. When they came to visit her, “they didn’t recognize me.” Her eldest daughter then wrote letters to government officials that led to her release after six months of her three-year sentence.

Her family was charged for the cost of her hospital stay.

Ms. Kang has two daughters. One is in college, and the other is ten years old. Officials put the younger daughter into state custody for a period, but have since released her to the care of her father. Ms. Kang does not weep when she describes her experiences in prison, but when she talks about her family she becomes upset:

My daughter is ten years old and she doesn’t laugh anymore….I talked to my oldest daughter on the phone recently, and she said, ‘Ma, you have to be careful….they’re looking for you in Beijing, and they still want to grab you. If they get you again, they’ll kill you.’ She tells me not to go home, because they’ll grab me as soon as I get there.

Families should be together for the holidays. You know, in China, the Lunar New Year is an important holiday, but these past four years, we haven’t been able to eat the holiday meal together even once.

I live in hiding now – even [the friend who brought me here] doesn’t know where I live. Last week, I almost got arrested by the Jilin police after the Beijing police told them where I lived.

Will I continue to petition? I have to continue. I can’t not continue.¹⁶⁰

B. Arbitrary Detention of Petitioners Without Trial

Petitioners report that often they are detained without formal charges or trials. Some are formally charged and tried for “disturbing public order.”¹⁶¹ Many end up in China’s notorious reeducation through labor (laodong jiaoyang or laojiao) system. There have been reports that local government officials sentence some petitioners to psychiatric institutions.¹⁶²

Chinese law gives police broad latitude––without judicial authority or review––to detain suspects for lengthy periods. Ren, a sixty-one year old farmer from Henan, described her detention without charges:

They took me to the detention center and I asked them what I had done. The officers said, ‘You’ve broken no law. You’ve done nothing illegal. This is to stop you from petitioning.’ I said, ‘I won’t go!’ So they dragged me, they twisted and pulled my left arm and forced me into the detention center.¹⁶³

Mr. and Mrs. Du from Shandong, who are petitioning about their son’s death in police custody, reported that they were each sent back twice to Shandong to be detained. Once, they were both detained without charges; on another occasion, Mr. Du was charged with insulting a police officer when he told the officer, “You are being unreasonable.”¹⁶⁴

Another petitioner reported that after she complained to the police that her husband and two neighbors gang-raped her, she was charged with making false accusations [wugao] and sentenced to a year in prison.¹⁶⁵ A Henan petitioner observed that there were a number of people petitioning in Beijing from her county, and added, “There are still seventy or eighty people in that [local] detention center [where I was detained], and they are all there for petitioning.”¹⁶⁶

Local detention facilities range from very basic jails in the local police station, to larger detention facilities. In a few provinces, authorities have established facilities specifically for detention of petitioners:

I’ve been detained many times. The shortest was for eight days, the longest was a month and a half. I was just held, [usually] there were no charges. But [in 2004] I was sent to the ‘petitioners’ custody and repatriation center’ in Harbin. There were about two or three hundred people detained there….I was detained for creating a social disturbance….I was beaten several times….There was no one in that detention center who had not been hit.¹⁶⁷

Chinese officials often engage in preventive detentions, placing activists around the country under formal or informal house arrest in advance of major holidays or meetings in Beijing.¹⁶⁸ A petitioner who had pursued his case in Beijing for many years said that he was placed under house arrest for a month around October 1, China’s National Day, a time when many petitioners descend on Beijing to pursue appeals. He said:

I was kept in my house for one month. The police came to my house and from September 17 to October 17 they kept me there…Go to work? Of course I couldn’t go to work! I couldn’t go anywhere. I could go out to the market to buy food, but they came with you. They even went to the bathroom with you. I am not kidding.¹⁶⁹

Reeducation Through Labor

Sentences of reeducation through labor (RTL)––made by police with no judicial recourse––are often used to punish petitioners for their activities.¹⁷⁰ According to the Ministry of Public Security, reeducation through labor is an administrative method of reform used to change offenders to people who obey and respect the law through compulsory labor. It was established in 1957 as part of the government’s campaign to reform citizens who commit minor offenses through “education.”¹⁷¹

However, the recipient of a reeducation through labor sentence has no right to a hearing, counsel, or any kind of judicial review. Sentences are often meted out by local police bureaus.

Conditions in reeducation through labor camps are harsh and the work load heavy. Prisoners work in mines or brick factories or do heavy agricultural labor.¹⁷² Liu Renwen estimates that there are over 310 institutions for reeducation through labor in China, and over 310,000 people detained in reeducation through labor camps.¹⁷³

Under the current system, people can be detained up to three years, which can be extended by another year based on the prison authorities’ judgment. In practice, some people can be detained longer. Said one petitioner:

I was sentenced to reeducation through labor. When my case went up to a more senior county official [for review], he said, ‘Lock him up until he dies.’¹⁷⁴

He spent ten months in RTL, then his family negotiated his release.

Petitioners who had been in RTL camps told Human Rights Watch that beatings were common, especially while inmates were working. Ms. Kang, a petitioner from Jilin province, said:

We worked eighteen hours a day making children’s toys to export to Japan. If you worked too slowly, you were hit and insulted.¹⁷⁵

Mr. Jiang, a petitioner from Shanxi, was forced to labor binding books:

We had to bind the books one page at a time and get each page just right. If you did it wrong, they would hit you across the back or shoulders with a cattle prod.¹⁷⁶

Two petitioners reported that they were force-fed after they went on hunger strikes to protest conditions.¹⁷⁷ One reported being shackled for minor infractions, such as wearing socks in cold weather or using hot water to shower.¹⁷⁸

Several petitioners reported that the longest sentences and worst treatment were meted out to members of the banned meditation group, Falungong, many of whom also petition in Beijing.¹⁷⁹ Kang reported that of the roughly one thousand detainees in her labor camp in Jilin, most were Falungong practitioners.¹⁸⁰ The government’s campaign against the group has been so thorough that even long-time Chinese activists are afraid to say the group’s name aloud. One Beijing petitioner said:

Petitioners are usually locked up directly. But the worst is [she whispers] Falungong. They have terrible treatment, not like the others. There was one sixty-nine year old lady [in prison with me] who had lost her right hand in a farming accident, and she was sentenced to two and a half years—for what? For trying to push a letter through a gate.¹⁸¹

RTL camps suffer from overcrowding, with inadequate food, water, and no heat in winter. Ms. Kang described the conditions:

There were eight people to a cell sleeping in bunk beds. Was it clean? Of course! We were being reeducated! They made us clean the floor on our knees.

Lights in the cells were left on twenty-four hours a day. We were paid two mao a day, six yuan [$U.S. .75] a month. Prices in the camps were inflated; a ground mat that would have cost seven mao outside was priced three yuan in the camp. If your family visited, you had to buy a meal that cost fifty yuan. But you knew you weren’t paying for the food, you’re buying time with your family.

In the camps, people used the toilet in threes. On some days, the labor was so intense that you weren’t allowed to leave to go to the toilet. In very busy times, we would only get three hours of sleep.¹⁸²

The ICCPR guarantees all persons the right to a fair trial and to a presumption of innocence until proven guilty.¹⁸³ Article 9(4) provides that “Anyone who is deprived of his liberty by arrest or detention shall be entitled to take proceedings before a court, in order that the court may decide without delay on the lawfulness of his detention...”¹⁸⁴ The U.N. Body of Principles for the Protection of All Persons Under Any Form of Detention also requires that persons “not be kept in detention without being given effective opportunity to be heard promptly by a judicial or other authority. A detained person shall have the right to defend himself or to be assisted by counsel as prescribed by law.”¹⁸⁵ The reeducation through labor system violates these and other provisions of international law. It removes the presumption of innocence, involves no judicial officer, provides for no public trial, and makes no provision for defense against the charges.

The ICCPR also prohibits forced labor. Article 8 states that “no one shall be required to perform forced or compulsory labor.”¹⁸⁶ While article 8 permits convicted criminals to be required to work as part of their punishment,¹⁸⁷ detainees in reeducation through labor camps have not been convicted of a crime in a court of law and should therefore be excluded from this provision. Moreover, international standards on the treatment of detainees demand that work undertaken be to their benefit. According to the U.N. Basic Principles for the Treatment of Prisoners:

Conditions shall be created enabling prisoners to undertake meaningful remunerated employment which will facilitate their reintegration into the country’s labor market and permit them to contribute to their own financial support and that of their families.¹⁸⁸

China is a member of the International Labor Organization (ILO) and has ratified twenty of the 100 active ILO conventions on labor standards. In June 2002 China’s only legally-recognized trade union, the All-China Federation of Trade Unions, was elected to the Governing Body of the ILO.¹⁸⁹

In 1998 the International Labor Conference approved a Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work. Article 2 of the Declaration states that all members, even if they have not ratified the conventions in question, have an obligation as ILO members to realize fundamental rights in the conventions including the elimination of all forms of forced or compulsory labor.¹⁹⁰ ILO Convention 29 defines forced labor as “all work or service which is exacted from any person under the menace of any penalty and for which the said person has not offered himself voluntarily.” Certain categories of persons are exempted from the ban on forced labor, but detainees, as opposed to persons convicted and sentenced by a court, are not among them. Regardless, even for those exempted from the ban on forced labor, according to article 12 of Convention 29, there is a sixty day limit per twelve months for compulsory labor.¹⁹¹

C. The Role of Beijing Police

Because the Chinese government believes that the growing flood of petitioners in Beijing poses a significant social order problem for the city, Beijing police and government security guards have shown increasing interest in having removed petitioners from the city. Petitioners report that Beijing security officers have often not interceded when they are attacked by retrievers, and that they ignore calls for help from petitioners.

As crowds of petitioners can rise to five or six hundred in front of a government petitions office on any given day, petitioners are often rounded up en masse by Beijing police. They are then taken to a detention facility in Beijing known as the Majia building, where they are detained for a short period until they are either released without charges, or turned over to retrievers. Explained one petitioner:

It used to be that people could go to petition, present their statements, wait in line, get numbers, and wait to be called up. Now they take down your name and identity number and what province you’re from, and drag you to the Majia building on South Number Four Ring Road. They can detain you there for a year, six months, a year and a half. Sometimes they call up police from your province to come and get you.¹⁹²

Some petitioners reported being severely beaten by provincial retrievers while they were in detention in Beijing. A Henan petitioner told Human Rights Watch that Henan police seized him and took him to the Majia building, where they broke his fingers, leaving them permanently damaged.¹⁹³

A woman from Jilin province who is partially disabled and walks with crutches said:

I was trying to block [Premier] Zhu Rongji’s car to give him my petition and the policemen grabbed me….I said, ‘The Communist Party has a constitution that protects my rights!’ There were five or six men. At the station, they wrestled me down and put my arms behind my back. I screamed, ‘Help me! Help me!’ but no one cared. Everyone there is paid off.¹⁹⁴

Petitioners also say that Beijing police and government security guards also stand by passively as retrievers beat and threaten them, ignoring their calls for help.¹⁹⁵ Mr. and Mrs. Gao, the Shandong couple who were beaten on the street in front of the State Council petitions office, told Human Rights Watch what happened after the beating:

I had hurt my leg and I dragged myself to the State Council because I couldn’t walk. My husband’s face was covered in blood, my umbrella was broken, and he could not even stand up straight because he had broken one of his ribs. I called out for help to the security guard who was [at the guard post] right inside the gate. He told us to go away.

I said, ‘How can I go away? I can’t even walk—my leg is broken!’ I asked him to call 110 [the police emergency number] but he didn’t. As soon as we got close to the State Council, the retrievers ran off. I told the guard, ‘You are the highest State Council, you cannot refuse to help me!’ I was yelling so loud that the whole street could hear me. The security guard said, ‘Stop yelling!’…We got to the hospital.¹⁹⁶

In other cases, petitioners reported to Human Rights Watch that they called 110, the police emergency number, to report that they were being attacked. But once police knew the callers were petitioners, they refused to intercede. Said one petitioner:

I was beaten up at the Communist Party Central Discipline Committee [office]. I called 110 and said, ‘I’m being beaten and taken to Liaoning, I’m in the procuratorate’s car.’

It was three people…and they were all wearing street clothes….These guys said, ‘You’re still complaining!’ They looked in my bag and pulled out [my documents] and said, ‘Who will look at those?’ They forced me into the car. I said to them, ‘You’re violating my human rights, this is against the law.’ They said, ‘What law, what are you talking about?’

The police I called finally came, but they couldn’t see me, and they called me back on my cell phone to ask where I was. I said, ‘I’m in the car!’ I started struggling with the door handle, and the [retrievers] were trying to stop me opening the door. I rolled down the window and started shouting.

The police looked right at me! They said on the phone, ‘No, we don’t see you anywhere,’ and left. They said on the phone, ‘You’re a petitioner, right?’ They saw me and they walked away.¹⁹⁷

According to one Beijing activist, a lawyer working with petitioners has recently filed a lawsuit with the city charging that police routinely ignore 110 calls from petitioners.¹⁹⁸

Beijing police have also reportedly used excessive force in the process of detaining petitioners who are Beijing residents. Bao, a longtime petitioner, reported mistreatment of a petitioner in front of the Beijing City People’s Congress building:

This old lady, it was her first time petitioning, and the cops pulled her and yelled at her, and when she went home her head was bleeding. She called me and said she had no money to go to the hospital and get it taken care of. We felt terrible, because we had no money for her. I said to her, ‘You have to see the doctor, one way or the other.’ The next day she and I went [to the hospital] together. We gathered 2,000 RMB [about U.S.$255]. I got really angry.

So the day after, I went and told [other petitioners] about it, and I said, ‘This is terrible mistreatment of the old hundred names [common people].’

Another petitioner reported that she was slapped during an interrogation by a district police chief in Beijing, and when she opened the door of the room to call for help, the station chief came in and also began to beat her.¹⁹⁹

Case Study: “I’m going to tell the national leaders what happened to me”

The petite, soft-spoken thirty-nine-year-old woman from Henan has just arrived in Beijing, and she shows signs on her face and clothes of having slept on the streets the past few nights. “I have to sell newspapers on the side of the road,” she explains. “My feet are swollen and hurt all day.” She carries a cloth knapsack with her clothes and belongings. She is deferential, speaks quickly and smiles apologetically when she becomes confused or is interrupted by others.

I was married by force [to a man I had known for one week] in 2000. I tried to leave my husband and he wouldn’t let me. The day after, two people came home with him. They ripped my clothes off and raped me. It was my husband and two of our neighbors.

I complained, and the police detained him for a few days. Then they let him go….I think he paid a bribe. I left him over four years ago, and he still lives there.

After I started petitioning, the police detained me instead. I was in Beijing, and the retrievers came and talked me into going back. When I went back with them, they put me in jail. They said it was a detention pending investigation….I was detained this way on two occasions for several months, each time.

The third time was in July 2004. I was at the National Office of Letters and Visits…and [the retrievers] came and talked me into going back. They took me to the guesthouse [where they were staying]. They said if I went back, they would take care of my problem locally. But when we got [to Henan], they dragged me into the county jail. For making ‘false accusations’ against my husband, I was sentenced to one year in prison.

She gives Human Rights Watch a few documents: her statement, neatly handwritten by someone else, with her red thumbprint on it in place of a signature; a letter from a lawyer at a university legal clinic in Beijing supporting her claim; and a court sentencing document stating that because she was married to one of her attackers, the gang rape was not a real rape, and thus she is convicted of making “false accusations” [wugao] against her husband, and sentenced to a year in prison.

She goes on to describe conditions in the local prison, where ten women shared a cell:

They shackled my hands and feet. The first time it was because the weather was cold, and we had to go outside [to work], so I put on socks. They yelled at me and put me in shackles.

The second time, it was because I used hot water to shower. No one else showered with hot water. They shackled me for twelve days.

The third time, it was because I was washing clothes all day and I was tired, so I rested for a while. They shackled me for two days.

The fourth time it was 6:30 in the morning, and the sky was light, and people were singing because they couldn’t sleep. They were Falungong people singing, and I sang along with them. I’m not Falungong, but I joined in the song. [The guards] asked me if I had started them singing, I said that I hadn’t, I just joined in. So they chained my hands and feet, like this [demonstrates]. Four men held me down to shackle me. I was shackled for seven days.

The fifth time I went two days without food, so they chained my hands and feet, because I went on hunger strike.

They made me sign a confession. They forced me to sign. They said if I didn’t sign, I couldn’t leave.

I am a victim. My family doesn’t understand me. I’m alone. I’m not even divorced, so no one cares [that my husband organized a gang rape].

In May, I got out of that jail. I just got to Beijing two days ago. I came on my own. They wouldn’t give me my backpack back at the jail. My keys, some money, my ID card, my phone, my umbrella, a lot of things were all in there, and they wouldn’t give it back to me. So I came back here to petition….I’m going to tell the national leaders what happened to me.²⁰⁰

D. Violations of the Right to Freedom of Assembly

As the number of petitioners in Beijing has grown, petitioners from different provinces have begun to compare their experiences. Some have organized mass protests about their treatment.

China’s constitution, as well as international law, guarantees the right to freedom of assembly. However, in practice the right to freedom of assembly is severely limited in China, with applications to assemble arbitrarily denied and protests routinely broken up by force. This, too, has been the experience of many petitioners and activists working with petitions.

In the wake of the June 4, 1989, massacre of protesters in and around Tiananmen Square, China passed a “Law on Assemblies, Marches and Demonstrations” (Jihui youxing shiwei fa) that sets out a detailed permit procedure for anyone wishing to hold a public protest of any kind.²⁰¹ The law stipulates that protest organizers should file an application within five days of the proposed demonstration describing the “purpose, methods, chants, slogans, numbers of people, numbers of automobiles, types and numbers of sound systems, start time, location (including start and finish locations), and names, occupations and addresses of contact people and people in charge.”²⁰² According to the law, police are required to respond with approval or refusal within two days.²⁰³

The May 1 regulations prohibit petitioners from engaging in illegal assembly in front of government offices, but provide no more clarity than the Law on Assemblies about just what constitutes an illegal assembly. An official publication advising potential petitioners about their responsibilities under the new regulations strongly advises against spontaneous protests and points out that the basic rights of Chinese citizens to organize lawful protests are protected by the Law on Assemblies, Marches, and Demonstrations.²⁰⁴

Petitioners and activists who have attempted to apply for permission to demonstrate report that their requests are routinely refused or go unanswered. Protests in cities other than those in which the organizers are formally registered as residents are prohibited, making it illegal for people from outside of Beijing to organize protests in the national capital.²⁰⁵

In practice, however, police do not often prohibit protests. According to government figures, in 2004 there were approximately 74,000 demonstrations around the country.²⁰⁶ Given the plethora of social problems in a quickly evolving society, the government and Party appear to feel the need to allow public protests as a pressure release valve for public grievances. The problems for petitioners and others who take to the streets to protest is that a charge of illegal assembly can always be laid on individuals or groups particularly disliked by local officials, making it unclear what is permissible and what is not.

Jailing of Individuals for Applying for Permission to Protest

In several cases, police have simply arrested people for applying for a protest permit. The Beijing police have even retaliated against some activists just for filing applications to protest. Says one activist working with petitioners:

There have been many applications for protests….They never get a formal response, but they sometimes get arrested [on other charges] as a result of their applications for protest permits.²⁰⁷

Ye Guozhu is one of the most prominent activists jailed for attempting to apply for a protest permit. The Ye family is becoming a petitioning dynasty. Ye’s brother, Ye Guoqiang, attempted to commit suicide by jumping into the Jinshui river near Tiananmen Square to protest his family’s forcible eviction from their Beijing home to make way for Olympics-related construction. Ye Guoqiang was arrested and sentenced to two years for disturbing social order for attempting suicide in public as a form of protest.²⁰⁸ His family was left homeless by the eviction. After this, Ye Guoqiang’s brother, Ye Guozhu, became a prominent petitioner on forced evictions cases in Beijing.

In August 2004, Ye Guozhu joined with Tianjin-based activist Zheng Mingfang, lawyer Ni Yulan, and others to apply for permission to hold a 10,000-person march in September. Police detained Ye Guozhu three days later.

An activist who attempted to attend Ye Guozhu’s trial reported that he was kept at home by state security agents. He reported what he later heard about the trial:

Aside from me, another guy was put under house arrest. Over one hundred people went to the court door and all wanted to go in and hear the trial, but the court [staff] wanted each person to register their name and address. All of them registered. Then the court called the local police station of each person’s home to come and get them, so over a hundred cop cars came to get them. Other people watching said, ‘What is going on at the court?’ They sent everyone home.

In court, there should be sixteen seats for family and friends, but the court only gave them two, so Ye Guozhu’s son couldn’t get in. The people charging Ye said that he had been sleeping in front of a hotel, but the guy was homeless [because of his forced eviction], he had nowhere else to live. They said he wore clothes with writing on them about demolition and eviction, but wearing clothes is not illegal. They wouldn’t let [Ye Guozhu] speak at his trial.

Ye has a lawyer who told me that Ye had scars on his wrists. [The prison staff] tried to shave his head,²⁰⁹ but he resisted saying that he hadn’t committed any crime. So they hung him up by his wrists to force him [to let them shave his head].²¹⁰

In December 2004, a Beijing court sentenced Ye Guozhu to four years in prison.²¹¹ In July, Zheng Mingfang was also arrested and sentenced to two years’ imprisonment in Tianjin on charges of conducting “illegal business.”²¹²

Human Rights Watch has learned of two other cases of persons who appear to have been arrested for filing an application for a protest permit. Li Xiaocheng, a petitioner from Xinjiang, disappeared in August 2004 after filing an application for a mass protest in Tiananmen Square by petitioners. A colleague told Human Rights Watch that Li was approached by police who posed as journalists and instead detained him.²¹³ In June 2005, Li was formally charged with inciting an illegal protest.²¹⁴ Zhao Xin applied for a permit to hold a memorial march for former Chinese premier Zhao Ziyang in winter 2005. When he went to the police bureau to pick up his permit, Zhao was detained for two months.²¹⁵

In early May 2005, a group of activists working with petitioners applied for a permit to hold an anti-Japan demonstration. Earlier protests against Japan in April 2005 were believed to be state-sanctioned.²¹⁶ The group reportedly aimed to establish their constitutional right to protest. According to an activist familiar with the case, the Beijing government responded with an official statement that there never had been official protests against Japan. He also said those who applied for the permit were harassed by police.²¹⁷

Protests by Petitioners

As the result of grievances over the lack of response to petitions and limitations on freedom of assembly, activists working with petitioners say that spontaneous protests in front of petitions offices, foreign embassies, and United Nations buildings have become increasingly common. Police have responded with mass detentions, arrests, and beatings. Petitioners have also reported beatings by security guards responding to spontaneous protests in front of government offices where petitioners gather and wait to file their complaints.

In recent years, the numbers of mass protests by petitioners has grown, though many of the larger protests still go unreported in mainland media.²¹⁸ Frustrated petitioners have sometimes picked up en masse and taken their protests across town, to other government offices such as Zhongnanhai, the central government compound. Other protests have targeted foreign embassies and the U.N.²¹⁹ One participant in a protest at the German embassy in November 2004 recalled:

[Local police in Shanxi] said to me, ‘You go wherever you want, take the case up with whomever you want, it’s fine.’ The city said that they’d gotten orders from many levels before [from national authorities] and they were all just wasted paper. They said, ‘You want to go to the U.N., fine! Go complain wherever you want…’ They said I could go anywhere, so we [petitioners] said, fine….So we went to the German embassy….There were over thirty [protesters] there, each with his own problem…As soon as the police saw us, they took us away.²²⁰

Another petitioner recalled a spontaneous protest at the central government compound, Zhongnanhai in April 2003:

The protest was all peaceful, there were over one hundred [petitioners] in front of the Zhongnanhai main gate. We weren’t causing any problems. But after they detained me, I was charged with troublemaking and disturbing the work of government offices, and sentenced to two years….After I appealed, they [altered the sentence] to nine months, and I had already been detained nine months. They did it this way so that they wouldn’t have to pay compensation [for false conviction].²²¹

Ou told Human Rights Watch that she and her mother had participated in protests in front of the U.N. offices in Beijing:

There were many, many people there, but no one came out to talk to us. They handcuffed [my mother], but they didn’t arrest her, and there was no arrest warrant. They detained her for five days.²²²

In 2003, one group of petitioners protested in front of a government-owned company in Beijing. A petitioner reported that she was beaten and kicked by police in the process of detention:

Fifty to sixty people took part, and all of us were seized by police…They all grabbed us and pulled us onto the bus. I said ‘What are you doing?’ and I resisted. Then it started. Over ten police used their feet to kick us. I fell down, and they pulled my hands and dragged me head first….I got scraped all over and my left side was bleeding. They got me in the car and had my hands behind my back, and they struck my head on the floor many times….

They took us to a school [courtyard]. It was very hot. They pulled us in and I…lay on the ground, which was burning hot, and I got confused and passed out….The police officer took me to the hospital and told the doctor that I had been faking being unconscious, and that I was rolling around on the ground and had injured myself in that way….

But the Beijing court said that it didn’t happen and they wouldn’t issue a decision. They won’t take the case. They say there is no proof and they wouldn’t even hear the witnesses.²²³

In 2003, Sun Shuping applied for a permit for a protest of ten thousand in Beijing. The permit was refused. After Sun and Wu Daming went with a group of petitioners to Tiananmen Square to protest without the permit, they were arrested.²²⁴

Some groups of petitioners have also attempted mass suicide in public spots in Beijing, a traditional form of protest in China.²²⁵

Many more spontaneous protests erupt in front of offices where hundreds, sometimes thousands, of petitioners wait in line and vie to be heard by petition office staff. In other cities, such as Shenzhen, mass protests by petitioners in front of government offices have disrupted traffic and led to new injunctions against them by local government.²²⁶ Says one Beijing activist familiar with the situation of petitioners:

These kinds of protests happen daily, if you can call it a protest. The petitioners try to create dramatic scenes to get attention. There’s often some sort of protest going on. When [staff] people refuse to talk to them, they yell, they get angry.²²⁷

Police and security guards often respond with force to these protests, beating protesters and arresting them.²²⁸ Says another petitioner:

We all bang on the windows to get attention to submit the petitions, and the guards will just strike out and punch you in the face.²²⁹

Petitioners report that one petitioner from Gansu, Wang Yuanshi, may have been beaten to death inside the petitions office of the Supreme Court in November 2004, after petitioners began banging on the window to get attention of staff inside. One witness recalled:

Wang Yuanshi got beaten right in front of the court [petitions office]. They beat him to death….It was the afternoon when he and [another petitioner] went in. They were screaming and we heard them. Then one of [the petitioners] came out and told us they were being beaten by the court security guards. The next morning before it was even light out, we saw his body on the doorstep….There were forty people at the doorway, they all saw it too.²³⁰

Petitioners also mentioned that at least one other vocal petitioner has disappeared while petitioning in front of the Supreme Court petitions office.²³¹

Other petitioners commented that loss of life was a serious risk for them. As Ai said:

Two people died already in the past year—we don’t dare to say how, but they were both petitioners. People tell us to pay 1000 percent attention to our safety. We can be arrested at any time, and we can disappear at any time.²³²

On some occasions, protests have erupted when petitioners refuse to go peacefully with retrievers. One petitioner recalled that:

One time, before the Two Meetings, I saw police trying to take someone away from the Petitioners’ village. I went up to the police car and said, ‘This is not right. He has the right to petition. If he doesn’t want to go with you, he doesn’t have to.’ I asked the petitioner, ‘Do you want to go with them?’ And the petitioner said, ‘I don’t want to go.’ So I told the retrievers to leave. Three other people started to approach in a menacing way, so the retrievers backed down.

I often say to the petitioners, ‘If they take me today, tomorrow it will be your turn.’ But many of them don’t think this way….They still have this hope.²³³

E. Restrictions on and Harassment of Activists

As the petitioning problem has grown, a network of petitioner defenders and activists has begun to take shape. Some Chinese lawyers and rights activists help petitioners with their cases, advising them on how to file cases and helping them to access social services.

While this kind of assistance is generally permitted, the authorities have refused to allow some activists to register NGOs that would work exclusively on petitioners’ issues. Ye Mingjun, the son of Ye Guozhu, for example, attempted to register a new NGO to work with petitioners in Beijing in April 2005, and was refused registration.²³⁴ Registered NGOs also report that their staff members have been questioned and their computers seized and searched. Lawyers who work with petitioners in Beijing and Shanghai are reported to be under close police surveillance.²³⁵

Some petitioner activists have been jailed or detained for lengthy periods without formal charges. In November 2004, Li Guozhu, a farmers’ rights advocate, was detained after investigating deadly ethnic clashes in Henan province.²³⁶ Before his detention, Li said he had documented 2,670 individual detentions of petitioners around the country that took place between June and July 2004.²³⁷ Human Rights Watch has collected information on the cases of sixteen advocates working with petitioners who have been detained or have “disappeared” while doing their work (see Appendix A).

A few university legal aid centers and independent nongovernmental organizations are able to work with petitioners. However, even these have faced harassment and report that they believe they are under close police surveillance. In April, Adam Briscoe, a U.S. student on an internship with the Empowerment and Rights Institute, a Chinese NGO that provides legal advice and humanitarian aid to petitioners, was detained and interrogated. He was released after paying a fine of 500 RMB [about U.S.$60] for not carrying his passport.²³⁸ Briscoe told Human Rights Watch:

The police came into the office while I was the only one in there. They took me to the station and questioned me for six hours. They alternately had English and Chinese-speaking cops coming in to question me, and they just kept asking me the same questions in both languages. I just kept saying things like, ‘I love China, I love Beijing’…They brought in a big stack of papers in Chinese to sign, and I refused to sign them. Then they brought in an English-speaking cop who wrote out a confession that said I should have been carrying my passport. They fined me five hundred kuai.…They also searched my home and computer.²³⁹ 

This was only the first of a series of incidents by the government aimed at forcing the organization to stop its work. Prior to a visit in August 2005 to Beijing by the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Louise Arbour, the organization’s offices were raided once again.²⁴⁰ The director, Hou Wenzhuo, was placed under house arrest in an apparent attempt to prevent her from speaking to Arbour. Her apartment was surrounded by police and she was told she could not leave. She told a reporter at the time, “I haven't been out yet. I need to get some rest, and make preparations in case they detain me when I try to go out. I have to prepare for this.”²⁴¹ In October 2005, she was evicted from her apartment. “They told me this evening, absolutely this evening by 6:00 p.m., if I don't get out by that time they're going to do everything to get me out,” she told a journalist.²⁴²

In November 2004, eight police officers and a village mayor raided Sanchun Dadi [Spring on the Land], an independent Beijing NGO working with petitioners and other rural activists. They detained Li Guozhu, a volunteer working with the NGO. Witnesses told Li’s family of his arrest, but as of the time of writing police had not yet issued a formal notification of arrest or of his whereabouts. Some friends suspect that his detention was related to Li’s visit to a region of Henan where there had been an ethnic riot and martial law.²⁴³ This abduction by officials without acknowledgment of custody would amount to a “disappearance” under international law. ²⁴⁴

In another case a photographer, Sun Xiaodi, a petitioner and activist working on the problem of nuclear contamination of rivers in Gansu, “disappeared” on April 27, 2005. Sun had also documented police abuses of petitioners. His family has not been notified of his arrest.²⁴⁵ His daughter, Sun Haiyan, issued an “Open Appeal” for his return:

My father, Sun Xiaodi, was born in Shanghai in 1955, and was formerly employed at the No. 792 Uranium Mine. In 1989 he began petitioning the central government in Beijing on behalf of the 2,000-plus people who relied on the uranium mine for their living. In all of these years he never stopped. He always believed that justice would win out in the end. On April 28, 2005, my father suddenly disappeared. There has been no word of him since, and we don't know what happened to him. Some informed people have said that the police secretly detained him, but I have inquired with the Public Security Bureau many times, and they always reply that they have no news of Sun Xiaodi.

Petitioning is a basic right of all Chinese citizens, and my father did nothing wrong. My father's disappearance while exercising this right has had a heavy impact on my family. My mother's health was already poor, and my father’s disappearance has delivered a great physical blow to her. She also lost her job because of my father's petitioning activities. My father is the person on whom my mother and I hang all our hopes. My greatest wish is that my father can safely return to the bosom of his family as soon as possible.

As a daughter, I love my father very much; I miss him and think of him constantly. I urgently appeal to all concerned to unconditionally release my father, and I condemn these terrorist activities. Give me back my father, and give him back his freedom.²⁴⁶

Sensitivities about petitioner protests are so high that even those taking photos can find themselves in harm’s way. In March 2005, Michael Reynolds, a journalist with the European Pressphoto Agency, was photographing retrievers beating petitioners in front of the complaints office of the National People’s Congress. He was kicked and beaten by police. Reynolds told a reporter:

I was in front of the complaints office just observing how they were manhandling and harassing petitioners….As soon as I whipped out my camera, they (police) immediately encircled me and began grabbing me and my camera.²⁴⁷

F. Conditions in the Petitioners’ Village

Large numbers of petitioners now live in a shantytown near Beijing’s South Station known as the Petitioners’ village [shangfang cun]. Residents in the village estimate that there are over 10,000 people living there, but there are no official numbers.

Conditions in the petitioners’ village are extremely poor, as has been documented by domestic and international journalists.²⁴⁸ Petitioners and activists working with them reported to Human Rights Watch that the petitioners’ village is closely monitored by police and by paid informers, and that visitors are usually ejected by police within minutes of arrival.²⁴⁹ Many petitioners—farmers and other impoverished, marginalized people—start out with minimal resources to begin with, and their circumstances gradually deteriorate over the years until they end up homeless and mired in poverty. As one lawyer who has worked with many petitioners on their cases noted, “Gradually people spend everything they have and lose all dignity through ceaselessly petitioning.”²⁵⁰ Because they are not legal residents of Beijing, petitioners are unable to access government services, including health care and school, for themselves and their families.²⁵¹

Many petitioners are short-term residents in the village, coming to Beijing only for a few days to pursue their cases before they return home. Some become long-term or even permanent residents, hiding because they fear for their safety if they return home.²⁵² Mao, a petitioner from Henan, said that he, his sister, and his brother now all live in poverty in the petitioners’ village. Even though they have given up petitioning, the whole family is afraid to return to their hometown because they believe they will be killed by local authorities.²⁵³

On arriving in Beijing to pursue their cases, petitioners with some resources may stay at guesthouses near government offices, or in dormitories in the petitioners’ village that charge ten RMB [approximately U.S.$1.25] per night. These facilities may be clean, have relatively new beds, and include communal cooking areas.

                While they wait for their petitions to be addressed in Beijing, petitioners who have the      economic resources stay in dormitories in the petitioners’ village costing approximately           U.S.$1.25 a day.

                © 2005 Private

As they continue to pursue their cases over the years, petitioners often spend their own and their extended families’ resources, borrowing from friends and other family members. Over time, they may no longer be able to afford the nicer dormitories, and relocate to dormitories that charge three to five RMB a night, which contain simpler wooden beds and are less clean.

                As their finances dwindle, petitioners are forced to move into cheaper and shabbier         accommodations.

                © 2005 Private

These rooms are often overcrowded, says an activist:

A room that’s about eightysquare meters will fit twenty people. I used to live there. They have bunk beds, two people in a bunk….It’s a big disaster. You’ve never seen anyplace so messy and disgusting.²⁵⁴

Petitioners who are extremely impoverished, or who become impoverished over eight or ten years of petitioning, are reduced to sleeping on the streets in cardboard boxes or on beds improvised from discarded rags. Those living on the street are unable to access clean water supplies for washing or drinking.²⁵⁵

            After years of futile attempts at redress, some petitioners wind up living on the streets.

            © 2005 Private

Such petitioners say they suffer especially in Beijing’s cold winters. A petitioner named Yang told Human Rights Watch:

Last year, the winter was very hard. Where we live is very basic, we don’t have any money….I’ve been here for eight years, and there hasn’t been a single winter that has gone by where a petitioner hasn’t died from the cold.²⁵⁶

As one woman told Human Rights Watch:

In October 2004, my husband and I came back to Beijing to petition….We two old people had no place to live. Our grandchildren were living in a tent with us, and it was cold. They got injured by the cold.²⁵⁷

Under China’s household registration system (hukou), as non-residents of Beijing petitioners have the same status as other internal migrants in Chinese cities: they are the equivalent of illegal aliens, and are not able to work legally. Some petitioners told Human Rights Watch they made a living by repairing bicycles, selling newspapers, or picking through garbage to find bottles and boxes to sell for recycling.²⁵⁸ Others said they survived by gathering and eating refuse from nearby markets, including vegetables that were left unsold at the end of the day, or cuts of neck meat that butchers sold cheaply. Mrs. Gao explained:

We scavenge for food. We go to the market and gather up the vegetables that are left over. Also, we root around for bottles and other garbage to recycle, and we make at most about five or six yuan [U.S. 60 cents] each day.²⁵⁹

As part of their regular sweeps of petitioners in advance of major meetings, Beijing police sometimes demolish the petitioners’ village, leaving those who escape the mass detentions to weather the cold on the street without any shelter or supplies.²⁶⁰ In two reported instances, officers chased residents out from under a bridge, confiscating their food and belongings.²⁶¹

Access to government services in China is also based on residency. Only registered residents in a given city are permitted to send children to local schools or obtain medical care from local hospitals and government clinics. The hukou system has “created a rigid social hierarchy that was transmitted across generations, assigning very different entitlements to urban and rural residents.” ²⁶² Because petitioners are generally migrants from other provinces, they are refused care at Beijing hospitals, and are not permitted to send their children to Beijing city schools. Others are refused at private clinics because they cannot afford to pay fees.

It is not clear how many children are living in the petitioners’ village, and how many are long-term or short-term residents. Human Rights Watch obtained a photograph taken in 2005 of several children in the village, including two school-age girls holding a sign that read, “We want to go to school.”

One petitioner, the father of an eleven-year-old in poor health, reported that before the Two Meetings, local officials came to Beijing and offered to pay for his eleven year old son’s school fees if he stopped petitioning. He said, “No one had ever been concerned about that before, but suddenly they were concerned about him.” The day after the Two Meetings ended, however, “I got not one fen. They said ‘Teach him yourself, we don’t care.’”²⁶³ This petitioner summed up his situation by observing:

Do not tell me that China has human rights. We are less than dogs. No one protects us. Other people’s children go to school. Do our kids go to school? Who will give our children medicine? Immunizations?

If our kids get sick, we do the best we can. If we cure them, then they are cured. If we don’t, they die. I mean, that’s it. If my son gets sick today, he dies today.²⁶⁴

Case Study: “We will drag this out until you’re dead”

Mr. Ming is forty-one-years old and comes from Shanxi. A former small-town school teacher, he wears glasses and has a scholarly, serious air, speaking with a heavy Shanxi brogue. He begins his account by formally reading from a sheaf of papers that are his handwritten statements, and begins to elaborate from this as he goes along.

At 7:00 p.m. on January 31, 2002, five or six people went to my home. They brought an iron hammer. They came in and said nothing. They weren’t from our village, I had never seen them before, they were thugs. First they hit my wife and my younger brother’s wife in the head with the iron hammer. They were coming for me, but they didn’t know who they were dealing with. My brother attacked another one with a chair, and when it broke, he beat one of them to death with the chair leg….The other thugs ran away. We called 110 to report the attack, and said maybe three people were dead – my brother’s wife, my wife and the thug. In fact, my wife and my brother’s wife were only knocked out.

The police came half an hour later and only hung around for ten minutes….The police station chief came down, and he didn’t take any notes or any pictures. They just noticed that the one guy was dead. The police made no record of what happened, but the next day, the morning after the thugs left town, the police chief came to my house to look for the hammer that the thug left in my house. I said, ‘How do you know about the hammer?’ We hadn’t told them….I said, ‘We were injured, you have to give us some record of this incident….’ They refused.

So we went to the city police, the city government, and the county police, everyone. I did this for two years, and no one cared. They all knew [the village secretary] had [ordered the assault]. But he was a rich man, and he bought a car for the police chief….This man was running the local mine, then he became the village chief and the Party secretary and the representative to the People’s Congress. According to [Chinese law], you can’t hold all those positions one after the other…I challenged his power, and because he gave them the car, they stopped handling my case. Is this why he was attacked in the first place?

In 2004, I came to Beijing [to petition]…. The petitions office in Beijing sent a letter to provincial officials. The letter said… ‘This is a case of retaliation, please handle it.’ The province then sent a letter to the city [the same people who had already retaliated against them] ordering them to do the same.

After twenty days, I got a letter [from the province], and I took it to the city police chief. He said, ‘This case? We’ve handled it plenty already.’ He said to me, ‘You go wherever you want, take the case up with whoever you want. It’s fine. It’s all a waste of paper.’ He said, ‘You want to go to the U.N., fine. Go complain wherever you want. There will come a day when we’ll pick you up and arrest you.’

Over eight months, he has gone back and forth to Beijing, petitioning and receiving letters from national authorities that instructed local authorities to resolve his case.

The second letter I got after petitioning was from the Ministry of Public Security. They wrote to the province. The province said, ‘You are known to us here.’ ….The province said to go to the county. So I went to the county. The county said, ‘You go wherever you want. Later on, we’re going to come and get you.’ I waited two months there for the case to be sorted out. They told me they would sort it out. Finally I gave up, and came back to Beijing….

We used to have money, you know. We weren’t doing badly. I was a math teacher in junior high school for ten years. I’m an educated person. But [the local authorities] said to me, ‘We’ll spend you till you’re poor. You can go back and forth, back and forth, no problem…’

The director of the municipal petitions office [in my city] said, ‘We’ll drag it out till you’re dead [women tuosi ni]. Once you die, the problem is solved.’

He said, ‘If you sue the Communist Party, can you win?’

He shows stacks of slips of paper he has collected over the years, receipts for complaints he submitted to petitions offices in Beijing, and says, ‘These are useless.’²⁶⁵

[132] Jianrong, "Xinfang Zhidu Pipan (Critique of the Petition System)."

[133] Minzner, “Xinfang: An Alternative to the Formal Chinese Legal System,” Stanford Journal of International Law, (publication pending).

[134] “Zhonggong lianghui qi, Beijing yanqi shangfang shensu qingyuan [During Central government Two Meetings period, Beijing severely forbids petitioning and appealing],” Dajiyuan, March 20, 2005 [online], http://www.dajiyuan.com/gb/4/3/10/n482497.htm (retrieved July 26, 2005); “Lianghui zai ji, Beijing jiaqiang xinfang cuoshi [As Two Meetings near, Beijing strengthens petitioning measures], BBCChinese.com, February 26, 2005, http://news.bbc.co.uk/chinese/simp/low/newsid_4300000/newsid_4300800/430... (retrieved July 26, 2005).

[135] Zhao Ling, “Guonei shoufen xinfang baogao zhuang gaochen zhongshe [First domestic report on petitioning earns high-level attention], Nanfang zhoumo, November 4, 2004; Jim Yardley, “Chinese appeal to Beijing to resolve local complaints,” New York Times, March 8, 2004, p. A3; “The wages of China’s underdogs: More abuse of official power,” Radio Free Asia, December 8, 2004 [online], http://www.rfa.org/english/news/social/2004/12/08/china_petitioners/(retrieved April 18, 2005); Jehangir S. Pocha, “In struggle to be heard, rural Chinese pack Beijing,” Boston Globe, March 15, 2005 [online], http://www.boston.com/news/world/asia/articles/2005/03/15/in_struggle_to... (retrieved November 24, 2005).

[136] Murray Scot Tanner, “Torture in China: Calls for reform within China’s law enforcement system,” Prepared Statement to Accompany Testimony before the Congressional-Executive Commission on China (CECC), July 26, 2002 [online], http://www.cecc.gov/pages/roundtables/072602/tanner.php (retrieved July 23, 2005).

[137] Human Rights Watch interviews with Wu, Cai, Beijing, 2005; Murray Scot Tanner also notes that local Communist Party leaders sometimes “us[e] the police as a private army” as stated in “Torture in China: Calls for Reform from within China's Law Enforcement System,” Prepared Statement to Accompany Testimony before the CECC, July 26, 2002.

[138] Human Rights Watch interview with Hua, Beijing, 2005.

[139] Human Rights Watch interview with Hua, Cai, Mr. and Mrs. Lee, Beijing, 2005.

[140] Human Rights Watch interviews with Qi and Ming, Beijing, 2005.

[141] Human Rights Watch interview with Ming, Beijing, 2005.

[142] Human Rights Watch interview with Hua, Beijing, 2005.

[143] Human Rights Watch interview with Mr. and Mrs. Lee, Beijing, 2005.

[144] Human Rights Watch interview with Qing, Beijing, 2005; Human Rights Watch interview with Cai, Beijing, 2005.

[145] Human Rights Watch interview with Mrs. Lee, Beijing, 2005.

[146] Human Rights Watch interview with Hua, Beijing, 2005.

[147] Human Rights Watch interview with Pei, Beijing, 2005.

[148] Human Rights Watch interview with Feng, Beijing, 2005

[149] Human Rights Watch interviews with Hua, Pei, Ou, Mao, and Ren, Beijing, 2005.

[150] Human Rights Watch interview with Gong, Beijing, 2005.

[151] Article 22(4), People’s Republic of China Police Law (Jingcha fa). Promulgated on February 28, 1995, [online] http://www.xsjjy.com/flk/jcf.htm (retrieved November 24, 2005).

[152] United Nations, “Code of Conduct for law Enforcement Officials”, December 17, 1979 [online], http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu3/b/h_comp42.htm (retrieved November 25, 2005), arts 3(a) and 3(b). According to the Code of Conduct, law enforcement officers should use force only when “reasonably necessary” under the circumstances, and the use of force should be proportional to the objective.

[153] Article 7 of the ICCPR prohibits torture. Article 1 of the Convention Against Torture (CAT) defines torture as: any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as…intimidating or coercing him…when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity. Article 16(1) of the CAT states that: Each State Party shall undertake to prevent in any territory under its jurisdiction other acts of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment which do not amount to torture as defined in article I, when such acts are committed by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity. In particular, the obligations contained in articles 10, 11, 12 and 13 shall apply with the substitution for references to torture of references to other forms of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

[154] Human Rights Watch interview with Mao, Beijing, 2005.

[155] “Petitioners detained in advance of new law,” Human Rights in China, April 28, 2005 [online], http://www.hrichina.org/public/contents/press?revision%5fid=22118&item%5... (retrieved November 25, 2005).

[156] Human Rights Watch e-mail and telephone communications with Yu, Beijing, 2005.

[157] Human Rights Watch interview with Cai, Beijing, 2005.

[158] Human Rights Watch interview with Hua, Beijing, 2005.

[159] Human Rights Watch interview with Mrs. Lee, Beijing, 2005.

[160] Human Rights Watch interview with Kang, Beijing, 2005.

[161] “Fujian officials take revenge for complaints against them,” Radio Free Asia, September 11, 2004 [online], http://www.rfa.org/english/news/politics/2004/09/11/fujian_corruption/ (retrieved July 26, 2005).

[162] “Endless road to justice,” ChinaInformationCenter, April 18, 2005 [online], http://cicus.org/news/newsdetail.php?id=4441 (retrieved July 26, 2005); “Shanfang nu shouru zifen weisui [Female petitioner suffers abuse, fails in suicide attempt], Nanjing shibao, January 28, 2005 [online], http://news.sina.com.cn/s/2005-01-28/01594968598s.shtml (retrieved July 26, 2005); Human Rights Watch interview with Wu, Beijing, 2005.

[163] Human Rights Watch interview with Ren, Beijing, 2005.

[164] Human Rights Watch interview with Mr. and Mrs. Du, Beijing, 2005.

[165] Human Rights Watch interview with Qi, Beijing, 2005.

[166] Human Rights Watch interview with Ren, Beijing, 2005.

[167] Human Rights Watch interview with Qing, Beijing, 2005.

[168] “Petitioner roundup as NPC meets,” Human Rights in China, March 11, 2005 [online], http://www.hrichina.org/public/contents/press?revision%5fid=20891&item%5... (retrieved November 25, 2005).

[169] Human Rights Watch interview with Ming, Beijing, 2005.

[170] “Shanghai petitioner Wang Mingqing detained,” Human Rights in China, February 23, 2005 [online], http://www.hrichina.org/public/contents/press?revision%5fid=20519&item%5... (retrieved November 25, 2005).

[171] Liu Renwen, “Reform of China’s Reeducation through Labor System,” Criminal Policy, (New York: Publishing House of Chinese People’s Public Security University, 2004), excerpt from Ch. 7 published by The Brookings Institution, January 25, 2005 [online], http://www.brook.edu/fp/cnaps/events/20050125.pdf (retrieved July 20, 2005).

[172] “Reeducation through Labor in China,” A Human Rights Watch Campaign Document, [online], http://www.hrw.org/campaigns/china-98/laojiao.htm (retrieved July 20, 2005).

[173] Renwen, “Reform of China’s reeducation through labor system” excerpt from Ch. 7, published by the Brookings Institution, p. 3.

[174] Human Rights Watch interview with Cai, Beijing, 2005.

[175] Human Rights Watch interview with Kang, petitioner, Beijing, 2005.

[176] Human Rights Watch interview with Mr. Jiang, Beijing, 2005.

[177] Human Rights Watch interview with Kang and Qi, Beijing, 2005.

[178] Human Rights Watch interview with Qi, Beijing, 2005.

[179] For more information on the Chinese government’s campaign against Falungong, see Human Rights Watch, “Dangerous Meditation: China's Campaign Against Falungong”, A Human Rights Watch Report, February 2002, available at http://hrw.org/reports/2002/china/.

[180] Human Rights Watch interview with Kang, Beijing, 2005.

[181] Human Rights Watch interview with Ai, Beijing, 2005.

[182] Human Rights Watch interview with Kang.

[183] Article 14, ICCPR.

[184] Ibid., Article 9(4).

[185] U.N. Body of the Principles for the Protection of All Persons Under Any Form of Detention or Imprisonment, U.N. General Assembly Resolution 43/173 (1988), Principle 11.1, available at http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu3/b/h_comp36.htm.

[186] Article 8(3)(a), ICCPR.

[187] Ibid., Article 8(3).

[188] U.N. Basic Principles for the Treatment of Prisoners, U.N. General Assembly Resolution 45/111 (1990), Article 8, available at http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu3/b/h_comp35.htm.

[189] International Labor Organization (ILO), Governing Body 284th Session, June 2002, available at http://www.ilo.org/public/english/standards/relm/gb/docs/gb284/index.htm.

[190] ILO Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work (1998), Article 2, available at http://www.ilo.org/dyn/declaris/DECLARATIONWEB.static_jump?var_language=....
All Members, even if they have not ratified the Conventions in question, have an obligation arising from the very fact of membership in the Organization to respect, to promote and to realize, in good faith and in accordance with the Constitution, the principles concerning the fundamental rights which are the subject of those Conventions, namely:
(a) freedom of association and the effective recognition of the right to collective bargaining;
(b) the elimination of all forms of forced or compulsory labor;
(c) the effective abolition of child labor; and
(d) the elimination of discrimination in respect of employment and
occupation.

[191] ILO Convention 29 (Forced Labor Convention), Article 12, available at: http://www.ilo.org/ilolex/english/convdisp1.htm.

[192] Human Rights Watch interview with Qing, Beijing, 2005.

[193] Human Rights Watch interview with Mao, Beijing, 2005.

[194] Human Rights Watch interview with Kang, Beijing, 2005.

[195] Jehangir S. Pocha, “In struggle to be heard, rural Chinese pack Beijing,” Boston Globe, March 15, 2005.

[196] Human Rights Watch interview with Mrs. Lee, Beijing, 2005.

[197] Human Rights Watch interview with Hua, petitioner, Beijing, 2005.

[198] Human Rights Watch interview with Cai, Beijing, 2005.

[199] Human Rights Watch interview with Qi, Beijing, 2005.

[200] Ibid..

[201] Zhonghua renmin gongheguo jihui youxing shiwei fa [People’s Republic of China Law on Assemblies, Marches and Protests], ratified by the tenth meeting of the executive committee of the Seventh National People’s Congress, October 31, 1989; in Cao Kangfeng, Wang Xuejun, eds., Xinfang tiaoli fudao duben [Regulations on Letters and Visits Tutorial Reader], (Beijing, Zhongguo fazhi chubanshe, 2005); 412-418.

[202] Article 8, People’s Republic of China Law on Assemblies, Marches and Protests.

[203] Ibid., Article 9.

[204] Cao Kangfeng, Wang Xuejun, eds., Xinfang tiaoli fudao duben [Regulations on Letters and Visits Tutorial Reader], (Beijing, Zhongguo fazhi chubanshe, 2005); p. 342.

[205] Article 33, People’s Republic of China Law on Assemblies, Marches and Protests.

[206] Howard French, “Land of 74,000 Protests (but Little Is Ever Fixed),” New York Times, August 24, 2005.

[207] Human Rights Watch interview with Wu, Beijing, 2005.

[208] “Two sentenced to jail terms for causing disturbances on Tiananmen Square,” People’s Daily, November 23, 2003; http://english.people.com.cn/200311/28/eng20031128_129256.shtml, retrieved July 26, 2005.

[209] Head-shaving marks a person as a convict.

[210] Human Rights Watch interview with Song, 2004.

[211] “China continues crackdown on public intellectuals and activists,” Congressional Executive Commission on China, January 7, 2005; http://www.cecc.gov/pages/virtualAcad/index.phpd?showsingle=5002; retrieved July 26, 2005.

[212] “China jails Tianjin petitioner, arrests nineteen protesters,” Radio Free Asia, July 21, 2005.

[213] Human Rights Watch interview with Wu, Beijing, 2005.

[214] “China charges petitioner who applied to march on Tiananmen Square,” Radio Free Asia, June 24, 2005.

[215] Human Rights Watch e-mail correspondence with Liang, Chinese activist, 2005; Masha Loftus, “CCP pulling the pin from the nationalism hand-grenade,” Epoch Times, April 20, 2005.

[216] Howard French, “Chinese government permits rare protests against Japan,” New York Times, April 17, 2005.

[217] Human Rights Watch interview with Wu, Beijing, 2005.

[218] “Chinese petitioners protest in Beijing,” Radio Free Asia, July 21, 2004; “Shangqian ming jiefangjun tuiwujunren zai Beijing shiwei qingyuan [Over one thousand retired PLA soldiers protest and present petitions in Beijing],” Radio Free Asia, April 13, 2005; “Peasant advocates hospitalized in clash with officials,” Human Rights in China press release, May 3, 2005.

[219] “Petitioners dragged from gates as China’s leaders hold social justice meeting,” Radio Free Asia, February 23, 2005; “Shangfang shangdao Mei shiguan [Petitioners go to American embassy],” Boxun, July 15, 2005; http://www.peacehall.com/news/gb/china/2005/07/200507150115.shtml, accessed July 19, 2005.

[220] Human Rights Watch interview with Yang, Beijing, 2005.

[221] Human Rights Watch interview with Mao, Beijing, 2005.

[222] Human Rights Watch interview with Ou, Beijing, 2005.

[223] Human Rights Watch interview with Ai, Beijing, 2005.

[224] Loftus, “CCP pulling the pin from the nationalism hand-grenade,” Epoch Times; Human Rights Watch interview with Wu, Beijing, 2005.

[225] “Beijing suicide protesters spoke for thousands,” Radio Free Asia, July 14, 2004, http://www.rfa.org/english/news/social/2004/07/14/141010/, retrieved July 26, 2005.

[226] Chow Chung-yan, “Restrictions on petitions near government offices,” South China Morning Post, July 24, 2004.

[227] Human Rights Watch interview with Wu, Beijing, 2005.

[228] Philip P. Pan, “Cabbies can’t find China’s road to justice,” Washington Post, November 15, 2004.

[229] Human Rights Watch interview with Ming, Beijing, 2005.

[230] Human Rights Watch interview with Cai, Beijing, 2005. A second petitioner said he had witnessed Wang being dragged into the building, heard him shouting for help from inside the building, and saw his body lying on the steps of the building the following day. Human Rights Watch interview with Yang, Beijing, 2005. Human Rights Watch contacted another petitioner who said he could confirm this account, but was unable to interview him due to concerns for his safety.

[231] Human Rights Watch interview with Cai, Wu, Beijing, 2005.

[232] Human Rights Watch interview with Ai, Beijing, 2005.

[233] Human Rights Watch interview with Hua, Beijing, 2005.

[234] Human Rights Watch interview with Cai, Beijing, 2005.

[235] Human Rights Watch interview with Cai, Wu, and Andy [pseudonym], an American journalist, Beijing, 2005.

[236] “China: Crackdown on Activists Widening,” Human Rights Watch, December 23, 2004, [online] http://hrw.org/english/docs/2004/12/23/china9930.htm.

[237] “Beijing suicide protesters spoke for thousands,” Radio Free Asia, July 14, 2004; http://www.rfa.org/english/news/social/2004/07/14/141010/, retrieved July 26, 2005.

[238] “U.S. rights worker in China detained and interrogated,” Agence France-Presse, April 13, 2005.

[239] Human Rights Watch interview with Adam Briscoe [real name], Beijing, 2005.

[240] “Chinese Activist Evicted From Flat by Security Forces,” AP, October 1, 2005. http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2005/10/01/2003273993 (retrieved November 7, 2005).

[241] “Chinese Police Beat Up AIDS Activist During U.N. Rights Visit,” RFA, August 31, 2005. http://www.rfa.org/english/news./2005/08/31/china rights, (retrieved November 7, 2005).

[242] “Chinese Activists Evicted From Flat,” Associated Press, October 1, 2005.

[243] Human Rights Watch interview with Wu, 2004.

[244] The newly concluded International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance defines at Article 2 an enforced disappearance as “the arrest, detention, abduction or any other form of deprivation of liberty committed by agents of the State, or by persons or groups of persons acting with the authorization, support or acquiescence of the State, followed by a refusal to acknowledge the deprivation of liberty or by concealment of the fate or whereabouts of the disappeared person, which place such a person outside the protection of the law.” http://www.ohchr.org/english/issues/disappear/docs/E.CN.4.2005.WG.22.WP.... (retrieved November. 21, 2005)

[245] Human Rights Watch interview with Cai, Beijing, 2005.

[246] “Activist Disappears after Reporting Nuclear Contamination”, Human Rights in China, August 19, 2005 [online], http://www.hrichina.org/public/contents/press?revision%5fid=24102&item%5... (retrieved November 29, 2005).

[247] “US photographer beaten by Beijing police ahead of parliamentary meeting,” Agence France-Presse, March 3, 2005.

[248] Hu Feng and Jiang Shu, “Xinfang gongpeng [The pinnacle of petitioning],” Oriental Outlook, December 11, 2003, pp. 20-31; Hu Bo, “Beijing shangfang cun shengtai [Ecology of the Beijing petitioners’ village],” Oriental Outlook, December 11, 2003, pp. 36-45; Hannah Beech, “Nothing left to lose,” Time Asia, March 1, 2004, http://www.time.com/time/asia/magazine/article/0,13673,501040301-593608,... accessed April 18, 2005; Yi Ban, “The view beneath the bridge,” China Rights Forum 1 (2004): 56-59.

[249] Because of the security risk to petitioners in the village if they were known to have spoken with a human rights group, Human Rights Watch researchers did not visit the village, but interviewed residents and hired a photographer to document conditions there.

[250] Human Rights Watch interview with Zhou, Beijing, 2005.

[251] Hukou or household registration is a system of residency permits, issued by police, that state where citizens formally reside and that constrain them to accessing state services (medical care, education) in that region.

[252] Human Rights Watch interviews with Kang, Mao, Beijing, 2005.

[253] Human Rights Watch interview with Mao, Beijing, 2005.

[254] Human Rights Watch interview with Cai, Beijing, 2005.

[255] Ibid; Ban, “The view beneath the bridge,” p. 58-59.

[256] Human Rights Watch interview with Yang, Beijing, 2005.

[257] Human Rights Watch interview with Ren, Beijing, 2005.

[258] Human Rights Watch interviews with Hua, Mao, and Qi, Beijing, 2005.

[259] Human Rights Watch interviews with Mr. and Mrs. Lee, Beijing, 2005.

[260] Hannah Beech, “Nothing left to lose,” Time Asia, March 1, 2004, http://www.time.com/time/asia/magazine/article/0,13673,501040301-593608,..., retrieved April 18, 2005.

[261] Ban, “The view beneath the bridge,” p. 59.

[262] Institutionalized Exclusion: The tenuous legal status of internal migrants in China’s major cities, Human Rights in China, November 6, 2002; http://www.hrichina.org/fs/downloadables/doc/HRIC_Full_Report_Nov_2002.pdf?revision_id=10322 (retrieved July 26, 2005); p. ii. See the Human Rights in China report for a fuller discussion of rights of and abuses against internal migrants in the context of international human rights law.

[263] Human Rights Watch interview with Ming, Beijing, 2005.

[264] Human Rights Watch interview with Yang, Beijing, 2005.

[265] Human Rights Watch interview with Ming, Beijing, 2005.

Appendix: List of imprisoned and detained petitioner activists

The following is a selected list of confirmed cases of currently or recently imprisoned or detained petitioner activists:

Chen Enjuan – male, from Shanghai, sentenced to 21 months of reeducation through labor on December 2, 2002 for “disturbing public order” after attempting to petition in Beijing.

Li Boguang – male, thirty-seven-year-old human rights lawyer and writer and Director of Beijing’s Qimin Research Institute, who represented farmers in lawsuits against the government, was detained in Fu’an City on December 14, 2004 for alleged unspecified criminal offenses. He was released on January 21, 2005 on bail awaiting trial.

Li Guozhu - male, Liaoning petitioner and former police officer working with Sanchun Dadi, an independent Beijing NGO. Li was detained in November 2004 after a police raid on the NGO.

Li Xiaocheng - male, applied for a permit to hold a mass protest of petitioners in Tiananmen Square in August 2004; disappeared shortly thereafter. Reportedly he was detained by police who approached him while posing as journalists. He was formally charged with inciting protest in June 2005.

Ma Yaling – female, sentenced to 18 months of reeducation through labor in March 2004, in Shanghai after publishing an article online titled “A True Record of Being Turned Away from the National Petitions and Letters Office and the Petitions Bureau of the National People’s Congress.” Ma had previously been sentenced to reeducation through labor in 2001 by Shanghai Municipal Public Security Bureau, where both her legs were broken by the police.

Mao Hengfeng – female, she has petitioned to state authorities many years over her coerced abortion, her right to work, and other basic rights. In April 2004, Shanghai police sentenced her to eighteen months in reeducation through labor. She has been reportedly subjected to torture and ill-treatment there. She was released on September 12, 2005 completion of her 18-month term.However, she defied orders to stop protesting about this and other violations of her rights, and so the security forces have harassed and beaten both her and her husband, Wu Xuewei. Both are at risk of arbitrary detention and torture.

Sun Shuping – female, 32, from the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, was held in custody for holding an illegal gathering after she applied for a protest permit and was refused. Subsequently she was charged along with Wu Daming for bringing over 100 protesters on Tiananmen Square on December 12, 2003. Sun first came to Beijing to petition over family property.

Sun Xiaodi - male, Gansu petitioner who was active in protesting the industrial pollution of rivers near his home, disappeared in Beijing on April 27, 2005.

Wang Qiaojuan – female, along with Wang Mingqing and Yang Weiming, Wang Qiaojuan was detained by police in a Shanghai train station on June 24, 2005 as they were preparing to go to Beijing to protest the new national petition regulations. Wang has been formally charged with “disturbing peace in a public space.”

Wu Daming – male, 46, Sichuan Province, came to Beijing originally to appeal a debt dispute. He applied for permission to protest with Sun Shuping and was refused. Subsequently, Wu was also detained for organizing an illegal gathering and leading over 100 protesters onto Tiananmen Square in 2003. No additional information is available.

Xu Yonghai – male, 44, longtime advocate of housing rights and religious rights. Xu was detained in November 2003 and in March 2004 charged under Article 111 of the Criminal Law for “circulating state secrets.” He was sentenced to a two-year prison term in August 2004.

Ye Guoqiang - male, Beijing man who staged an attempted suicide protest in Tiananmen Square in October 2003, to protest his family's forced eviction from their home to make way for the Beijing Olympics. In November 2003, Ye was arrested and sentenced to two years in prison for disturbing public order.

Ye Guozhu - male, brother of Ye Guoqiang. Ye continued to petition on the family's forced eviction case. In August 2004 he applied for a permit to hold a march of 10,000 people. Three days later he was detained and in September charged with disturbing social order. In December 2004, Ye was sentenced to a prison term of four years.

Zhang Shangzhong, from Shaanxi Province, and Zhao Fengcai, from Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, were detained in Beijing in December 2004 for organizing a protest by petitioners at the Diaoyutai State Guest House, the site of some major meetings.

Zheng Mingfang – female, was sentenced by a court in Tianjin to two years’ imprisonment after she signed an application for 10,000 people to march on Tiananmen Square. The court charged her with “illegal business activities.”

Zhao Xin applied for a permit to hold a memorial march for former Chinese premier Zhao Ziyang in January 2005. When he went to the police bureau to pick up his permit, Zhao was detained for two months.

Acknowledgements

This report was researched and written by Sara Davis for the Asia Division of Human Rights Watch, and by Christine C. and Mike Goettig. It was edited by Brad Adams, Asia Division executive director; Sam Zia-Zarifi, Asia division research director; Joe Saunders, deputy program director; Mickey Spiegel, senior researcher; Zama Coursen-Neff, senior researcher; and Nisha Varia, researcher. Dinah PoKempner, general counsel for Human Rights Watch provided legal review. Jo-Anne Prud'homme and Andrea Cottom, associates for the Asia Division provided administrative and technical assistance. Production assistance was provided by Andrea Holley, manager of outreach and public education; Fitzroy Hepkins, mail manager; Veronica Matushaj, photo editor; Jagdish Parikh, online communications content coordinator; and Jose Martinez, production associate.

 

Human Rights Watch gratefully acknowledges the input and assistance of Carl Minzner and many other friends and colleagues who must remain anonymous.

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