Tag Archives: open letter

PEN International’s Open Letter: Time for China to release writers, journalists and activists

pen2016Today, on World Human Rights Day, our Pen International community of writers, readers, activists and publishers condemn the Chinese authorities’ sustained and increasing attack on free expression and call for an immediate end to China’s worsening crackdown on fundamental human rights. Continue reading

Joyce Huang: Detained Lawyers’ Families Send Open Letter to China’s Xi Jinping

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China Lawyers Crackdown: In this Wednesday, July 6, 2016 photo, Yuan Shanshan, the wife of detained Chinese lawyer Xie Yanyi, holds an official notice of Xie’s detention from the Tianjin Public Security Bureau in their apartment in Miyun, on the outskirts of Beijing.

As China hosts high-level political meetings in Beijing, the families of five jailed human rights lawyers have written President Xi Jinping an open letter, urging the top leader to stop a controversial nationwide crackdown of lawyers. Continue reading

Chinese Rights Lawyers Demand Immediate Release of Colleague

A man walks past a tricycle cart decorated with flowers and a poster with Chinese President Xi Jinping and other top leaders

A man walks past a tricycle cart decorated with flowers and a poster with Chinese President Xi Jinping and other top leaders, parked on a street in Beijing, July 9, 2016. Overseas bar associations and lawyers groups have issued an open letter to Chinese President

More than 140 human rights lawyers in China have endorsed a joint statement calling on Chinese authorities to immediately release lawyer Ren Quanniu, who was arrested late last week on suspicion of “picking quarrels.”

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Chinese website publishes, then pulls, explosive letter calling for President Xi’s resignation

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Chinese President Xi Jinping speaks with media in a press conference with his Iranian counterpart Hassan Rouhani after their meeting at the Saadabad Palace in Tehran, Iran, Saturday, Jan. 23, 2016. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)

Two weeks after China’s President toured state media offices and called for absolute loyalty from the press, a website with links to the government published an explosive letter asking him to resign “for the future of the country and the people.” Continue reading

Tienchi Martin-Liao: Horsetrading With Abduction

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From left to right: Chang Ping, Tienchi Martin-Liao, writer Ye Fu, and a friend, in Amsterdam in 2012. Image courtesy of the author.

 

China stretches out its hand to control the international media over the authorities’ abduction of a journalist’s family.

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Law Scholar Calls for Youth League Transparency

In recent weeks, a number of individuals have forcefully spoken out against the tightening climate for journalists, activists, lawyers, and others whose work may challenge authorities. Prominent journalists and bloggers have criticized increasing controls over the media and political demands for ideological conformity. An open letter, signed only by “loyal Communist Party members,” called on Xi to step down and threatened his physical safety, and has unleashed an official investigation that has led to the detention of family members of dissidents and writers. These increasingly audacious public challenges to Xi Jinping’s governing style have raised questions over the stability of the current government and Xi’s ability to effectively rule China. Continue reading

China Launches All-Out Probe Into Letter Calling on President to Resign

Chang Ping giving a speech in Hong Kong

Exiled Chinese journalist Chang Ping (L) shown giving a speech in Hong Kong, October 2014.

The ruling Chinese Communist Party under President Xi Jinping has launched a crackdown on the families of overseas dissidents as part of a nationwide probe into an open letter calling on him to resign. Continue reading

Chun Han Wong: China Hunts Source of Letter Urging Xi to Quit

More than 10 people reportedly missing after letter was published on Chinese news website early March
Xi Jinping

Since taking office three years ago, President Xi Jinping has concentrated more power in his hands than his recent predecessors. Photo: Reuters

BEIJING—A Chinese news portal’s publication of a mysterious letter calling for President Xi Jinping’s resignation appears to have triggered a hunt for those responsible, in a sign of Beijing’s anxiety over bubbling dissent within the Communist Party. Continue reading