Engnews November 2009

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RFA News: Chinese Activist's Family Gets US Asylum

by Sarah Jackson-Han

Also on www.rfa.org: Multimedia Journey Down the Mekong www.rfa.org/english/multimedia/MekongProject <http://www.rfa.org/english/multimedia/MekongProject> Lawyers, Activists Denied Access http://www.rfa.org/english/news/china/refusedaccess-11172009171720.html <http://www.rfa.org/english/news/china/refusedaccess-11172009171720.html> Chinese Activist's Family Gets US Asylum HONG KONG, Nov. 19, 2009-The wife and two children of a jailed Chinese rights lawyer have been granted political asylum in the United States, Radio Free Asia reports. Zhang Qing, the wife of jailed Chinese rights lawyer Guo Feixiong, and their two children were notified of their status on Nov. 19, she told RFA's Mandarin service in her first interview since arriving in the United States in early April. "I was notified this morning," she said. Zhang and her children fled their home in Guangzhou in late January and reached Thailand in early February before continuing to the United States. Zhang said she is relieved to have been granted asylum, adding that she and her children, Xixi and Jinbao, had been persecuted by the Chinese government because of her husband's civil right work. "I lost my job. Jinbao missed an entire year of schooling. Xixi's schooling was also under their control. Our bank account was frozen. Our lives were greatly disrupted. It was under these circumstances that we left China," Zhang said. Guo Feixiong is currently serving a five-year jail term for "illegal business activities." Zhang said that while she now feels safe, she and the children miss Guo and are concerned for his health. "We have heard a lot of news about him, but it is all bad news. He was beaten. He sustained injuries to his arm. Family members were prohibited from visiting him," Zhang said. She said Guo had asked to see his attorney in prison, but that each attempt to meet had been blocked by prison officials. "We are deeply worried about his well-being," she said. Taishi corruption In mid-2005, Guo Feixiong was beaten by police in China's southern Guangdong province after representing villagers seeking to remove their local Communist Party head, whom they accused of corruption in a lucrative property transaction. "[Guo] was involved in the [village chief] recall campaign of Taishi village... He offered legal assistance to the villagers in their attempt to exercise their rights to democratic elections," Zhang said. But Zhang said the movement was suppressed by "as many as 1,000 riot police," leading to Guo's arrest and the detention of "scores of villagers." Guo was incarcerated for 3-1/2 months but eventually exonerated and released. Zhang said that Guo had refused food and water while in prison to protest his "illegal arrest" and was subject to government harassment after being released. "He was followed everywhere. He was not allowed to leave his home and was placed under house arrest. His personal freedom was restricted. He endured beatings on three separate occasions," she said. 2006 arrest Guo was arrested again in September 2006 after becoming involved in a campaign to release fellow rights lawyer Gao Zhisheng. Authorities charged him with engaging in illegal business activities after publishing an article exposing official corruption in the northeastern city of Shenyang. Zhang said that while Guo's case was remanded twice on grounds of insufficient evidence, he was subjected to brutal treatment at the hands of the Guangzhou police. "For 42 days his hands and feet were tied together to a hardboard bed. Even under such brutality he did not succumb and refused to confess. Without evidence the case could not go on," she said. Guo was transferred to custody in Shenyang, which Zhang called "a place known for its brutal treatment of prisoners." "He was hit in the genitals with electric batons" by prison guards there, Zhang said. "While this wrongful case was being processed he was interrogated 175 times... The police knowingly violated the law. They fabricated the case against him," she said. Mistreatment in prison Zhang said that Guo has been constantly abused while serving his current sentence. "As soon as he was transferred to the Meizhou prison [in Guangdong province], the prison authorities drew three yellow warning lines in front of his cell. He was not allowed to cross the lines. He was not allowed to have any kind of contact with the other inmates," Zhang said. "The prison authorities also ordered him to do labor. He went on a hunger strike to protest," she said. Guo began seeking an appeal for his case in early 2008, but Zhang said that the process has been delayed. She said Guo had not even been allowed to meet with his attorney until November last year. "According to the law, the lawyer and his client are supposed to meet face-to-face across a table without police presence. They are supposed to be able to speak freely without being monitored or recorded," she said. But Zhang said Guo and his lawyer were forced to speak to each other on a phone through a glass window with police listening in and recording their conversation. "Given the circumstances they were not able to even touch on the core of the problem. So the meeting, which was granted only after almost an entire year's effort, was a total waste," she said. Zhang said a request to meet with his lawyer again this year has been met with "tremendous obstructions." Call for rights Zhang called on Chinese authorities to safeguard Guo's legal rights. "I have heard so many times that he has been brutally beaten and that he has sustained injuries-this on top of the torture he had endured before." Zhang said inmates' personal safety should be guaranteed according to China's prison laws and regulations. "I call on the prison authorities to fulfill at least this most basic requirement," she said. Zhang also called on authorities to grant Guo the right to pursue an appeal and to meet with his lawyer. "From my first open letter to President Hu Jintao I have been urging the Chinese government to resolve and to re-evaluate this wrongful case in a just way, and to exonerate and free him." Zhang said. "I reiterate my plea: Stop persecuting Guo Feixiong and release him," she said. "I also call on everyone in China and the international community to express their concern about Guo Feixiong's case, as well as those against other rights lawyers and dissidents." Original reporting by Zhang Min for RFA's Mandarin service. Mandarin service director: Jennifer Chou. Translated by Jennifer Chou. Written for the Web in English by Joshua Lipes. Edited by Sarah Jackson-Han. Radio Free Asia is a private, nonprofit corporation broadcasting and publishing online news, information, and commentary in nine East Asian languages to listeners who do not have access to full and free news media. RFA's broadcasts seek to promote the rights of freedom of opinion and expression, including the freedom to seek, receive, and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers. RFA is funded by an annual grant from the Broadcasting Board of Governors. If you no longer wish to receive RFA news releases, send an e-mail to engnews-leave(a)rfanews.org. To add your name to our mailing list, send an e-mail to engnews-join(a)rfanews.org #####

15 years, 1 month

RFA News: North Korea's Underground Bunkers

by Rohit Mahajan

Also on www.rfa.org: Multimedia Journey Down the Mekong www.rfa.org/english/multimedia/MekongProject Drug Abuse Among Hong Kong Teens www.rfa.org/english/news/china/youngerabusers-11122009130512.html North Korea's Underground Bunkers Hundreds of bunkers are decoys, a defector says, while hundreds more contain material for a possible invasion. SEOUL, Nov. 16, 2009-North Korea built hundreds of bunkers at the demilitarized zone (DMZ) separating it from South Korea even as the previous Seoul government pursued its policy of opening to the North, Radio Free Asia (RFA) reports. A well-informed North Korean defector said in an interview that Pyongyang had built at least 800 bunkers, including an unknown number of decoys, to prepare for a possible invasion of South Korea while South Korean president Roh Moo Hyun was in office. "Each bunker contains military equipment that can fully arm 1,500 to 2,000 soldiers," the defector told RFA's Korean service, adding that construction began in 2004-the second year of the Roh government. "If a soldier carried all his military equipment, which weighs 32 kilos, and came to the DMZ in full gear, he would already be exhausted before infiltrating into the South. So they built bunkers at the DMZ and put all their operations equipment there," he said. The defector, who once worked as an informant for South Korea's Defense Intelligence Command (DIC), uses the alias Kim Ju Song. He declined to give any personal details and asked to have his voice disguised for broadcast to protect relatives still in North Korea. He is scheduled to arrive in the United States on Monday and attend a closed-door session with U.S. legislators in Washington Wednesday. More than 1,000 bunkers planned "In the bunkers, there are South Korean military uniforms and name tags, so that they can disguise themselves as South Korean troops. Also reserved are...60-mm mortar shells, condensed high explosives, and all sorts of bullets." The bunkers are not linked to a series of underground passages built in the past to attack South Korea, he said. About 70 percent of the roughly 800 bunkers are fakes, he said, decoys "to confuse the South." "The North was trying to finish constructing bunkers by early 2008 with the target number of 1,000 to 1,200," Kim said. Nuclear-armed North Korea possesses one of the world's largest standing armies, employing some 1.2 million of its 22.7 million citizens in the military. The bulk of the forces are deployed along the DMZ and make use of a vast and complex tunneling network to hide their movement from the South Korean military in South Korea's capital Seoul-a mere 40 kms (25 miles) away. Kim resettled in Seoul in the early 2000s and worked with the DIC from 2004-2007. As director of a trade center run by the military, he was given the military title sangja, somewhere between lieutenant colonel and colonel. Through his work for the DIC, Kim said, he wanted to let people in South Korea know the North is not giving up "its principal target of unifying the Korean Peninsula by using armed force." "Regardless of Seoul's appeasement policy, or whatever the South does toward the North, Pyongyang hasn't given up its aim of unifying the Korean Peninsula by military force. They are sticking to this principle and teaching North Koreans about it," Kim said. Trade center with military ties South Korean intelligence authorities asked Kim to explain the bunkers in August 2005, he said. Two months later, he said, "I delivered to the DIC my investigation results, including the fact that the North began to build the bunkers in 2004 and that their purpose is to reserve military equipment for attacking the South." "In August 2006, I enticed a North Korean platoon leader, who was involved in building the bunkers, into Yanji, China, where three DIC agents interrogated him for two days. So we got all the information about the bunkers, such as the bunkers' blueprints and how thick their walls and covers are." South Korean intelligence officials declined to comment on Kim's account. Kim also described his work in North Korea as director of a military-affiliated trade center at a city in the North. "I worked as a trader for a long time, but I worked as director for six years," he said. "In each province, there are around two trade centers that are run by the North Korean military." Trade centers and their employees are given military status "to intensify the power of control, and to separate the military affiliates from the society, so that we are not bothered by local leaders. The purpose is to give special status to the military affiliates and help us earn more hard currency." Although he declined to explain why he chose to defect, Kim said he eventually bribed his way into China, where he spent two months before his connections there arranged passage to South Korea. "I have a human network in China that I built while I was in North Korea. I got some help from them," he said. "I used to visit China for business. And my Chinese counterparts also came to North Korea. Those business exchanges helped me build the human network." Radio critical North Korea allowed ships to carry shortwave radios as a safety measure after a seismic wave struck North Korea's East coast and killed thousands of fishermen in 2005, Kim said. Radio channels were fixed to government frequencies, but North Koreans took advantage of this relative relaxation to begin smuggling in radios from China and are now selling them on the black market. Pyongyang remains deeply wary of international broadcasts, he said. "The North Korean government's biggest concern is international radio broadcasts like those of Radio Free Asia. Content promoting democracy and disclosing leaders' corruption as well as North Korea's human rights situation-the Kim Jong Il regime considers this its biggest threat." "When people learn these things, they don't believe in the regime anymore. In this context, I think those broadcasts are fulfilling their mission fully and serving as a pillar for the spirit of the North Korean people." Original reporting and translation by Song-Wu Park in Seoul. Written and produced in English by Sarah Jackson-Han. Radio Free Asia is a private, nonprofit corporation broadcasting and publishing online news, information, and commentary in nine East Asian languages to listeners who do not have access to full and free news media. RFA's broadcasts seek to promote the rights of freedom of opinion and expression, including the freedom to "seek, receive, and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers." RFA is funded by an annual grant from the Broadcasting Board of Governors. If you no longer wish to receive RFA news releases, send an e-mail to engnews-leave(a)rfanews.org. To add your name to our mailing list, send an e-mail to engnews-join(a)rfanews.org ##### Rohit Mahajan Media Relations Manager Radio Free Asia Desk: (202) 530-4976 Cell: (202) 489-8021 Email: mahajanr(a)rfa.org http://www.rfa.org/

15 years, 1 month

RFA News: Document Details Executed Tibetan's Trial, Appeal

by Sarah Jackson-Han

Also on www.rfa.org: Multimedia Journey Down the Mekong www.rfa.org/english/multimedia/MekongProject Drug Abuse Among Hong Kong Teens www.rfa.org/english/news/china/youngerabusers-11122009130512.html Document Details Tibetan Trial, Appeal HONG KONG, Nov. 16, 2009-Court documents relating to one of three Tibetans believed to have been executed by the Chinese authorities for their part in the Lhasa unrest of March 2008 have confirmed the identity of one of the men, Radio Free Asia (RFA) reports. According to the documents, judicial authorities in the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) of China handed down a death sentence to Lobsang Gyaltsen, who was convicted of burning a Han Chinese shopowner to death during the unrest of March 2008. "For committing arson, the defendant Lobsang Gyaltsen is sentenced to death and to the revocation of his life-long political rights," the Lhasa municipal People's Intermediate Court said in its judgment, a copy of which was seen by RFA's Tibetan service. Tibetans in China and overseas had previously reported the executions of at least three people convicted of rioting during last year's widespread uprising against Chinese rule. The reports mentioned one Lobsang Gyaltsen, 24, of Lubuk township, near Lhasa. Accomplices cited The court documents confirmed that a Tibetan tour-guide named Lobsang Gyaltsen, known also by his Chinese nickname Banzhang, was detained March 24, 2008, by Lhasa police on suspicion of involvement in setting fire to shops during the unrest. The disturbances flared March 14 in Tibetan regions of China following three days of peaceful protests in Lhasa. Lobsang Gyaltsen was formally arrested on April 1, 2008. The Lhasa municipal procuratorate, or government prosecution service, accused Lobsang Gyaltsen of "actively participating in assault, smashing, looting, and burning" in the Ramoche street area of Lhasa on March 14. "During the afternoon of that day, Lobsang Gyaltsen set fire to the Hongyu Kuye Garment on Qingnian Lu with the help of fellow accused Pen Kyi," the court judgment said. "The victim Zhao Rancun was a Han Chinese national, 45 years old, who died due to burns," the judgment said, while estimating the damage to Zhao's shop from the fire at 250,000 yuan (U.S. $36,600). "The accused also set another garment store, Niaomo Shijia, on fire, causing damage worth 1.1 million yuan (U.S. $161,100). The judgment, issued by the appeals department of the Lhasa municipal People's Court, said subsequent investigations had interviewed Zhao's wife and son and the owner of the Niaomo Shijia garment store. He was also convicted of inciting others to participate in riots and of assaults on police, it said. "The court found that Lobsang Gyaltsen did participate in the March 14 arson, threw stones at the armed police on Ramoche street and instigated Tenzin (another accomplice) to participate in the arson." "At 14.00 hours on the same day, Lobsang Gyaltsen, with the assistance of Pen Kyi, set the Hongyu Kuye garment shop on fire," it said. "Lobsang used his lighter to set fire to a shirt which he threw on the pile of clothes in the shop. Pen Kyi threw kerosene oil that she brought with her which caused the fire to catch and engulf the whole store in flames." In October, Tibetan exiles and residents of the region first reported the execution of several people convicted of rioting during last year's widespread uprising against Chinese rule. They were the first reported executions in connection with rioting that erupted in March 2008 in the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) capital, Lhasa. Capital punishment is administered only rarely in Tibet, experts say. Mixed plea The judgment, dated April 8, 2009, said that Lobsang Gyaltsen denied setting fire to Hongyu Kuye Garment but acknowledged setting fire with an accomplice to the Niaomo Shijia shop, which deals in clothing as well as precious metals. It said that his legal representative Phuntsok Wangyal appealed for a lighter sentence, but that the appeal was turned down. It said he was sentenced according to Clause 1, Articles 57 and 115, of the Criminal Law of the People's Republic of China. Before his execution, according to one source, Lobsang Gyaltsen was permitted a visit with his mother. "I have nothing to say, except please take good care of my child and send him to school," he was quoted as telling her. A local source said Lobsang Gyaltsen's mother's home is now under round-the-clock surveillance. Rioting rocked Lhasa in March last year and spread to Tibetan-populated regions of western China, causing official embarrassment ahead of the August 2008 Beijing Olympics. Chinese officials say 21 people-including three Tibetan protesters-died in the violence. The India-based Tibetan government-in-exile estimates that 220 Tibetans were killed and 7,000 were detained in a region-wide crackdown. The Tibetan Center for Human Rights and Democracy reported separately that four people were executed on Oct. 24. A recent Congressional-Executive Commission on China (CECC) report said that at least 670 Tibetans have been jailed in 2009 for activities that include peaceful protest or leaking information abroad. By the end of April 2009, TAR courts had sentenced 84 Tibetans to punishments ranging from fixed jail terms to life, as well as to death or death with a two-year reprieve, in connection with the 2008 riots, the CECC report said. The report also detailed a widespread Chinese "patriotic education" campaign that requires Tibetan monks and nuns to pass examinations on political texts, agree that Tibet is historically a part of China, and denounce the Dalai Lama, the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader. Original reporting by Dolkar for RFA's Tibetan service.Translated by Karma Dorjee. Written for the Web in English by Luisetta Mudie. Edited by Sarah Jackson-Han. Radio Free Asia is a private, nonprofit corporation broadcasting and publishing online news, information, and commentary in nine East Asian languages to listeners who do not have access to full and free news media. RFA's broadcasts seek to promote the rights of freedom of opinion and expression, including the freedom to "seek, receive, and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers." RFA is funded by an annual grant from the Broadcasting Board of Governors. If you no longer wish to receive RFA news releases, send an e-mail to engnews-leave(a)rfanews.org. To add your name to our mailing list, send an e-mail to engnews-join(a)rfanews.org #####

15 years, 1 month

RFA News: Lao Group Wanted Help

by Sarah Jackson-Han

Also on www.rfa.org: Multimedia Journey Down the Mekong www.rfa.org/english/multimedia/MekongProject Interview with President Obama's Brother www.rfa.org/english/news/china/mark-obama-memoir-11132009105323.html Drug Abuse Among Hong Kong Teens www.rfa.org/english/news/china/youngerabusers-11122009130512.html Poems by North Korean Teen Defectors www.rfa.org/english/news/korea/moonpoetry-11112009111951.html Lao Group Wanted Help Several hundred Lao people detained on their way to the capital weren't dissidents, one man says. BANGKOK, Nov. 13, 2009-An ethnic Lao man briefly detained this month as he and several hundred others converged on the Lao capital to petition the government has said the group was planning to seek help from the authorities rather than stage a political protest, Radio Free Asia (RFA) reports. "What have we done that is so wrong, that we had to be detained? All we were doing was asking the government for help. I want to live with dignity even if it costs my life," the man, 47 and an illegal migrant worker in Thailand, said in an interview. He spoke on condition of anonymity to protect himself, his three children, and his wife-one of nine people who remain in Lao custody after they were detained en route to Vientiane on Nov. 2. The man was detained briefly and then released. He said he was legally "stateless," having left Laos after the Communists took power in 1975, then met his wife and married in a Thai refugee center. He has no Lao identification documents and works illegally in Thailand, one of what he described as "hundreds of thousands" of illegal Lao laborers there. The couple have three children: a 22-year-old daughter, a 21-year-old son, and an eight-year-old girl, all born in Thailand. The older two attended school through the sixth grade, he said, adding that the oldest child works in construction alongside her parents in Thailand. "When you are so poor, you do what you have to do to survive-and you sell whatever you have to sell to survive, your labor or yourself. It's so sad... We have become merchandise." The Seattle-based Lao Students Movement for Democracy estimated that authorities had detained more than 300 people traveling to Vientiane from North and South. Most were quickly released, but the nine still in custody have been moved to Samkhe Prison in Vientiane, the group said in a statement, dated Nov. 5 and written in Lao. The Lao government has denied detaining anyone, saying the reports were "fabricated" to harm the country's image. Lao sources identified those still detained as Ms. Kingkeo, 39; Mr. Soubin, 35; Mr. Souane, 50; Mr. Sinprasong, 43; Khamsone, 36; Mr. Nou, 54; Ms. Somchit, 29; Mr. Somkhit, 28; and Sourigna, 26. Family members confirmed that all nine were under arrest, sources who asked not to be named said. Some are linked to the Oct. 26, 1999 student protests in the communist Southeast Asian country-four of whose leaders remain in Samkhe prison in Vientiane after one died in custody. The man told RFA's Lao service that the group, which last year decided to call itself Lao United for Economic and Social Renewal, was seeking economic and social support from the government as well as the re-integration of ethnic Lao returning from abroad. "Everyone who was arrested was an average common person, not an activist," he said. "They have grievances... they just wanted to petition." "The Vietnamese [living in Laos] have more rights than Lao people in Laos-it's not right. Why this crackdown on us-when other vices are rampant and no one is doing anything about real crime?" Nov. 2 convoys On Nov. 2, a convoy set out from the Nam Ngum dam area of Thalat in Vientiane province, heading to Vientiane by taxi when authorities intercepted them in Phone Hong town, some 60 kms from Vientiane and also in Vientiane province, at around 5 a.m., relatives said. Two busloads carrying about 75 travelers each meanwhile set out from the south, and were detained in Pakading town some 70 kms from Vientiane in Borikhamxay province, witnesses said. They had planned to meet several hundred others at the Patuxay monument in Vientiane, sources said. Tiny, landlocked Laos, with a population nearing 7 million, is one of the world's poorest countries. Literacy and life expectancy are low, and most of the population is engaged in subsistence agriculture. Original reporting by RFA's Lao service. Lao service director: Viengsay Luangkhot. Executive producer: Susan Lavery. Produced in English by Sarah Jackson-Han. Radio Free Asia is a private, nonprofit corporation broadcasting and publishing online news, information, and commentary in nine East Asian languages to listeners who do not have access to full and free news media. RFA's broadcasts seek to promote the rights of freedom of opinion and expression, including the freedom to "seek, receive, and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers." RFA is funded by an annual grant from the Broadcasting Board of Governors. If you no longer wish to receive RFA news releases, send an e-mail to engnews-leave(a)rfanews.org. To add your name to our mailing list, send an e-mail to engnews-join(a)rfanews.org #####

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Engnews November 2009