Jan 24, Yinan county, Shandong. From RFA’s Mandarin service (ZH):
Yuan Weijing and her two-year-old daughter were pulled back home suddenly while they were on their way to nearby Linyi municipal jail to visit blind family planning activist Chen Guangcheng. Four journalists from a German television station were waiting for her not far from the family’s home in Dongshigu village. They were set upon and beaten by some of the security officers guarding Wei.
At 4.30 p.m. local time on Jan. 24, the German TV crew, consisting of three men and one woman, took up their positions outside the Chen family home, about 20 meters from his front door. They were pushed to the ground by the government-hired heavies guarding her home. A Chinese interpreter with the crew called out: “We are from the foreign media. We have something to say to you!”
Yuan came rushing out of her house, and saw that the heavies had each picked up a large stone to throw at the journalists, who quickly boarded their vehicle and left the village.
Yuan was pulled back into her home forcefully by the guards, who ripped her jacket in doing so. She was unable to visit Chen that day, which was the only designated monthly day for family visits at the Linyi jail.
Yuan asked them why they were preventing her from leaving. One of the guards replied: “The leaders don’t want you to go, so you’re not going.” Asked why not, he replied: “I am just doing my job. I am taking their money, and so I have to carry out this shameful duty.”
This is the fourth month in a row that Yuan has been prevented from going to visit her husband in jail.
On Jan. 9, more than 40 thugs surrounded Yuan’s home to prevent her from meeting with a German journalist. Chen’s brother was warned by local officials at the same time that if he met with the foreign reporter he might be charged with subversion. The meetings were cancelled.
Chen Guangcheng was sentenced to four years’ imprisonment in August 2006 for “damaging property and organizing a mob to disturb traffic.” His lawyers and wife say the charge was trumped up by local officials angered by his blistering exposure of abuses by local family planning officials under China’s one-child policy.
Image: Yuan Weijing with her daughter in Beijing, July 2007. Courtesy of Hu Jia.
Filed under: China | Tagged: 2008_olympics, beijing_2008, chen_guangcheng, china_civilrights, china_civil_rights, china_health, china_law, china_media, china_rights, East Asia, east_asia, family_planning, freespeech, governance, human_rights, linyi, media, Newsdesk, olympics_2008, one_child_policy, press_freedom, shandong, women, yinan_county, yuan_weijing |
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