|
Gao Zhisheng, age 43, who has been under house arrest since
November 2007, was taken into custody on or shortly after 19 January. He
is being held incommunicado at an unknown location. In the light of the
harsh treatment he received earlier, he is considered to be at high risk
of torture and other ill-treatment. While under house arrest, he was
often humiliated by his guards: this included being forced to eat food
thrown on the ground.
An army veteran,
self taught lawyer,
Christian Gao Zhisheng, is director, founder and star litigator of the well known Beijing based Shengzhi Law Office. The office, because
it is one few Chinese law firms involved with human rights issues, has been suspended
by the Chinese authorities
for one year. Mr. Gao and his
family's ordeal started when his conscience led him to start investigating the persecusion
of Falun Gong and wrote three
open letters to the top Chinese
officials.
In 2000 he moved
to Beijing and established the Shengzhi Law Office with a half dozen other lawyers.
In 2001 he was voted as one of the 10 Best Lawyers
in China, because of his
professionalism and integrity,
often helping poor people without fees suing local Chinese government branches
and officials. Gao Zhisheng
wrote one open letter
to the National Peoples' Congress in 2004 and two open letters to Hu Jintao and Wen Jibao in 2005, before his open letter to the members of the U.S. Congress,
requesting that they stop the persecution toward Falun Gong practitioners.
On November 4, 2005 Beijing Municipal
Bureau of Justice's official notice closing the firm for failure to notify the authorities of its change
of address and the “illegal”
submission of legal
documents to a lawyer who
does not work for the
firm, is received by Gao Zhisheng.
In December 2005, Gao wrote
an open letter resigning
from the CCP in which
he revealed that his investigations into the persecution of
Falun Gong had lead him to lose hope completely in the CCP.
On January 17, 2006, according
to an Epoch Times report, Mr. Gao escaped an assassination attempt allegedly ordered by the Chinese government. The attempted
car crash plot came in the wake of the release
of Mr. Gao's research
reports on the prosecution of Falun Gong in mainland China, and his subsequent resignation of
CCP membership.
In Feb. 2006 Gao called
for a Hunger Strike Support Group to Support Human Rights, which organized relay hunger strikes by thousands of
people in China in support of human rights.
In December 2006, he was sentenced to three years in prison for
"subversion of the state," with a
five-year "suspended
sentence," and denial of all of his constitutional rights, such as freedom of speech and free association, for one year. Gao and his family have been under
strict surveillance by the authorities ever since, and they have been repeatedly harassed. Thugs have beaten
his daughter, apparently under the
direction of someone—or some
faction of—the CCP.
While Gao was still free, he and his family were subjected to 260 days of daily harassment by the police, which
included three attempts on Gao's life. On Aug. 15 2006, Gao was arrested on the charge of "inciting
subversion." After Gao's
arrest, his family continued to be subjected to intense harassment, which included attacks on his wife Geng He and his daughter Geng Ge.
In April 2007, Gao
Zhisheng reported other Chinese activists that he had been treated harshly by police during a four-month period in custody in 2006, including being handcuffed and forced to sit in an iron chair or
cross-legged for extended
periods, and having bright lights shone at him. He said he only
agreed to confess to his ëcrimeí in order to protect his family.
Gao Zhisheng, received
high human rights honors for his work defending the rights of various groups in China. In 2007, Gao Zhisheng was given the "Courageous Advocacy Award" brom the American Board of
Trial Advocates. On June
24, 2007, Gao was kidnapped
by the Chinese government
in order to prevent him from attending the award ceremony in Santa Barbara, California,
on June 30, 2007.
Gao Zhisheng wad kidnapped again on September 22, 2006 by members
of the State Security Bureau, but the Chinese authorities have made no official announcement
of his detention.
According to Hu Jia, a close contact of Gao Zhisheng, he might have been taken away by officers from either the State
Security Bureau or the National Security Unit of the Beijing Public
Security Bureau.
The visit to Gao Zhisheng’s
house by state security personnel was apparently linked to his issuing of an open letter
to the US Congress on 13 September,
drawing attention to the deterioration
in the human rights
situation and stating that,
in light of this, he could not support the country’s
staging of the 2008 Olympics.
Hu Jia, Beijing-based AIDS activist, received a phone
call from Gao Zhisheng,
on October 28, 2007. Hu reported
their conversation, which
lasted only one and a
half minutes. Gao warned
Hu Jia not to take risks to visit his family, otherwise, the authorities would seek revenge against him.
In August
2008 reports surfaced that he had been tortured for close to two months
in the same way that Falun Gong practitioners
are tortured, where authorities attempted to force him to denounce Falun Gong, that had attempted to commit suicide, and
that had been removed from Beijing during the Olympic games.
PLEASE TAKE ACTION NOW !
RECOMMENDED ACTION: Please send appeals to arrive as
quickly as possible, in English, Mandarin or your own language:
- calling on the authorities to release Gao Zhisheng immediately and unconditionally;
- if he remains in custody, calling on the authorities to reveal where he
is and the formal charges against him;
- urging the authorities to guarantee that he will not be tortured or
otherwise ill-treated while he remains in custody;
- urging them to ensure Gao Zhisheng
has access to his lawyers, and any medical treatment he may require;
- calling on the authorities to take effective measures to ensure that
all human rights defenders can carry out their peaceful activities
without fear of arbitrary detention, imprisonment, hindrance or
intimidation, in line with the UN Declaration on Human Rights Defenders.
APPEALS TO:
Prime Minister of the People's
Republic of China
WEN Jiabao Guojia Zongli
The State Council General Office
2 Fuyoujie
Xichengqu
Beijingshi 100017
People's Republic of China
Fax: +86 10 65961109 (c/o Ministry of Foreign Affairs)
Salutation: Your Excellency
Minister of Public Security of
the People's Republic of China
MENG Jianzhu Buzhang
Gong’anbu
14 Dongchang’anjie
Dongchengqu
Beijingshi 100741
People's Republic of China
Fax: +86 10 63099216 (it may be difficult to get through, please keep
trying)
Salutation: Your Excellency
Director of the Beijing Public
Security Bureau
MA Zhenchuan Juzhang
Beijingshi Gong'anju
9 Qianmen Dongdajie
Dongchengqu
Beijingshi 100740
People's Republic of China
Fax: +86 10 85222320
Email: wbjc＠sohu.com
Salutation: Dear Director
TAKE
ACTION NOW !
|
