{"id":7471,"date":"2016-08-23T03:17:37","date_gmt":"2016-08-23T07:17:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.chinesepen.org\/english\/?p=7471"},"modified":"2016-08-25T03:23:11","modified_gmt":"2016-08-25T07:23:11","slug":"as-the-school-year-begins-chinese-dissidents-children-are-left-out-in-the-cold","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.chinesepen.org\/english\/as-the-school-year-begins-chinese-dissidents-children-are-left-out-in-the-cold","title":{"rendered":"As the School Year Begins, Chinese Dissidents’ Children Are Left Out in the Cold"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Petitioners

Petitioners whose children have been been denied access to school protest in Beijing’s Fengtai District, Aug. 20, 2016. Photo courtesy of Ran Chongbi<\/p><\/div>\n

As millions of Chinese schoolchildren and college students were back in class at the start of the new academic year on Monday<\/span><\/span><\/span>, the children of some dissidents and critics of the ruling Chinese Communist Party continue to be denied access to education, activists told RFA.<\/p>\n

Grassroots activist Ran Chongbi, who has previously been detained by Chinese police for her support of the 2014 pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong, said her school-age daughter has been barred from attending state-run schools for the past five years.<\/p>\n

Ran, who once ran an unofficial school for the children of evictees and other long-term petitioners in Beijing’s Fengtai district, in a bid to address the problem, called on the authorities to allow her daughter and the children of around a dozen other families to go back to full-time study.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have had a number of calls from the government and from the school principals to inform me that there is nothing they can do about it,\u201d Ran said, on the first day of China\u2019s fall semester. \u201cThey just keep telling me that my kid isn\u2019t allowed to attend school.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMy child has committed no crime, and her schooling has nothing to do with my complaints about the government\u2019s injustices,\u201d she said. \u201cMy kid shouldn\u2019t be tarred with the same brush, and inherit the status of \u2018petitioner\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ran tried home-schooling her own and other petitioners\u2019 children last year in a rented apartment in a Beijing suburb, in a bid to solve the problem.<\/p>\n

But the school was soon ordered to leave the premises, after pressure was put on the landlord of the apartment.<\/p>\n

Ran, who once traveled to Hong Kong with the intention of self-immolating over the 2008 rape of her then five-year-old daughter, had planned to teach a different curriculum to that laid down by the education ministry.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy child is the future of this country, and \u2026 the government has a duty to educate her,\u201d she said. \u201cPresident Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang are always talking about not allowing the poorest peasant families to end up on the streets,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Pressure on petitioners<\/b><\/p>\n

Fellow petitioner Hao Huanglin said all children should have the right to attend school, regardless of who their parents are.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe authorities react [to petitioners] with persecution and detention,\u201d Hao said. \u201cNow they are saying we can\u2019t send our kids to school.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt doesn\u2019t matter which schools we apply to; they won\u2019t enroll them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hao said the government seems to be insisting that petitioners end their rights campaigning and return to their hometowns.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey are trying to force us to leave [Beijing],\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Authorities in the eastern province of Anhui last week released rights activist Zhang Lin from a three-year jail term on public order charges after he campaigned publicly for his daughters to be allowed to attend school.<\/p>\n

Anni and her elder sister Ruli left China for California after their father’s arrest in August 2013<\/span><\/span><\/span>, where they were taken in by Reggie Littlejohn, founder of the Women’s Rights Without Frontiers rights group, and granted political asylum.<\/p>\n

Anni was dubbed “China’s youngest prisoner of conscience” after she was taken out of school by state security police and detained for several hours in February 2013<\/span><\/span><\/span>, and prevented from attending school during her father\u2019s house arrest.<\/p>\n

After his daughters\u2019 escape, Zhang and three fellow activists were jailed for \u201cgathering a crowd to disrupt public order\u201d for their role in the campaign for Zhang Anni\u2019s place in school.<\/p>\n

However, Zhang Lin\u2019s whereabouts are still unknown following his release, indicating that he may still be under police surveillance, rights groups said.<\/p>\n

Reported by Goh Fung and Hai Nan for RFA\u2019s Cantonese Service, and by Kou Tianli for the Mandarin Service. Translated and written in English by Luisetta Mudie.<\/b><\/i><\/p>\n

Source: http:\/\/www.rfa.org\/english\/news\/china\/china-education-08222016145145.html<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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