FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: July 7, 2009
Contact: John Estrella 202 530 4900 estrellaj(a)rfa.org
<mailto:estrellaj@rfa.org>
Rohit Mahajan 202 530 4976 mahajanr(a)rfa.org
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Radio Free Asia Named Broadcaster of the Year at 2009 New York Festivals
RFA Reporters, Services Take Record 7 Awards
WASHINGTON, DC - Today, Radio Free Asia was named Broadcaster of the
Year by the New York Festivals for winning the largest number of awards
among participating broadcasters. Four of Radio Free Asia's nine
language services won top honors for excellence in journalism in the
international competition, which included three gold, one silver and
three bronze medals.
"While Radio Free Asia has consistently been honored at the New York
Festivals over the years, it is deeply gratifying that the outstanding
work by our staff won a record number of awards this year," said Libby
Liu, President of Radio Free Asia. "RFA reporters work tirelessly under
the most difficult circumstances to bring uncensored news to our
listeners. On a daily basis, they overcome seemingly insurmountable
obstacles in environments that are hostile for journalists.
"We are inspired by this high recognition. We will continue our quest
for journalistic excellence to make an even bigger impact on the lives
of those we serve."
Information about the winners and their submissions follows:
* Broadcaster Shohret Hoshur of the RFA's Uyghur service won a
gold medal in the Best Human Interest category for her exclusive story
on an ethnic Uyghur woman in China facing a forced, third-term abortion.
International pressure resulting from the story led to authorities
releasing the woman, who was able to give birth to a son.
* RFA's Burmese service won a gold medal in the category of Best
Ongoing News Story for its excellent coverage of Cyclone Nargis, which
both warned listeners of the approaching storm and, after it made
landfall, helped survivors find desperately needed food, shelter,
medical attention and other humanitarian aid.
* Reporter Ding Xiao of RFA's Mandarin service won a gold medal
in the category of Best Investigative Report for her story on a
petitioner from China's eastern Jiangsu province who was held by
authorities without due process in a "law study group" detention center
for disciplinary re-education.
* Reporter Peter Zhong of RFA's Mandarin service took a silver
medal in Best Investigative Report category for his four-episode story
titled "Crime without Punishment" in which he exposed the extent of
Guilin's police-run underworld through his extensive coverage on female
prisoner abuse.
* Reporter Jill Ku of RFA's Mandarin service won a bronze medal
in the category of Best Special Report for her exclusive story, which
caught on audio and video Chinese police arresting a petitioner, who was
being interviewed by RFA, during the Beijing 2008 Olympics.
* RFA Mandarin Service's Asia Pacific Report was awarded a bronze
medal in the Best Newscast category for its story on Chinese lawyers
attempting to file a civil lawsuit on behalf of the families of victims
of the tainted milk powder scandal that left at least six infants and
children dead and 300,000 suffering from related ailments.
* Giao Pham of RFA's Vietnamese service was awarded a bronze
medal in the National/International Affairs category for his timely
coverage on young Olympic protestors being arrested and beaten by police
for demonstrating against China's torch carrying in Hanoi - a story
which was not covered by media inside Vietnam.
To follow Radio Free Asia's breaking news and developing stories
happening throughout East Asia, please visit our Web site at www.rfa.org
and sign up for RFA's news in English via Twitter at
https://twitter.com/RadioFreeAsia.
# # #
Radio Free Asia is a private, nonprofit corporation broadcasting and
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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.
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Rohit Mahajan
Communications
Radio Free Asia
2025 M Street, NW
Washington DC, 20036
(202) 530-4976
mahajanr(a)rfa.org
Tight Security After Deadly Xinjiang Clash
Go to www.rfa.org/english/news/special/XinjiangRiot <http://www.rfa.org/english/news/special/XinjiangRiot> for complete multimedia coverage
HONG KONG-Residents of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) report a heavy police and paramilitary presence inside and outside the regional capital, Urumqi, where deadly clashes erupted at the weekend following a protest by ethnic minority Uyghurs, Radio Free Asia (RFA) reports.
"The situation in Gulja is so intense right now. I saw armed police everywhere when I went out to buy oil this morning. I saw five armored vehicles patrolling the streets. There are many police cars, patrolling on every street," one man told RFA's Uyghur service.
"Military police are stationed in front of every government building and other work units. Since armed police blocked the main entrance to Ili Teachers' College, I went home through the back door," he said, adding that officials in the northwestern XUAR city of Gulja had imposed a curfew.
"They said they are going check every vehicle from other towns. They said it's better for us to remain inside," the man said.
The weekend clashes, which left at least 156 dead and hundreds injured, flared after an initially peaceful demonstration took to the city's streets to protest how authorities handled recent violence between majority Han Chinese and mostly Muslim Uyghur factory workers in the southern province of Guangdong, witnesses said.
According to the official Chinese Xinhua news agency, some of the 156 dead were retrieved from Urumqi streets and lanes, while others were confirmed dead at hospitals. Xinhua also said more than 700 suspects had been taken into custody.
Urumqi is home to 2.3 million residents, including many Uyghurs, who have chafed for years under Chinese rule. The city is located 3,270 kms (2,050 miles) west of Beijing.
Security forces were now manning checkpoints at strategic points throughout the city, and ethnic minority officers were being drafted from outlying regions to help interrogate detained suspects, police said.
Security is always tight in the XUAR, and after the clashes phone service was in many instances suspended. Uyghur witnesses spoke on condition that they remain unnamed.
Strip-searches reported
"The information we are getting is that this is sort of spreading," World Uyghur Congress and Uyghur American Association leader Rebiya Kadeer told a news conference at the National Press Club in Washington late Monday.
"We have heard news that in Hotan, in Aksu, in cities like Karamai, there were protests. And because of the tragic event, many people were killed and a lot of families and friends were killed. So others may have joined in other towns as well to protest," said Kadeer, whom Chinese authorities have blamed for instigating the clashes.
A former businesswoman in Xinjiang who served time in prison for alleged subversion, she denied instigating the clashes.
Sources at Xinjiang University estimate the number of dead at "nearly 400," including many outside Xinjiang University, Kadeer said, but she cautioned that "we can't confirm" that number.
A Uyghur man living in Saudi Arabia said residents of the old Silk Road city of Kashgar were reporting that some 300 people tried to stage a protest outside a mosque and at the local People's Square but were quickly suppressed.
A Uyghur youth in Kashgar gave a similar account. "A protest was planned in Kashgar today at 3 p.m.," he said.
"But first they set up checkpoints on every road into Kashgar, then there were two or three Chinese soldiers in various places. But after 3 p.m., the government brought a lot of armed forces in around the Heytkar Mosque," the youth said.
"They blocked both sides of the mosque and wouldn't let people in or out. They took a lot of photos and video and detained some people."
In Urumqi, meanwhile, the city was tense but calm.
Residents said numerous intersections had been blocked, and police were said to have surrounded a Uyghur settlement, called the Horserace Track, and detained all adult males.
"They are gathering them in the field, strip-searching them, and pushing them down to lie on the field, naked," one man said.
"This morning they also took away many youths from that area whether they participated [in the protest] or not. They just took away many Uyghur youths."
Electroshock weapons
Other witnesses described a heavy presence by security forces on Sunday.
Before the demonstrators reached the People's Square in central Urumqi, armed police were in position and moved to disperse them, one witness said.
Police "scattered them [the protesters]," he said. "They beat them. Beat them, including girls, very, very viciously," he said. "The police were chasing them and captured many of them. They were beaten badly."
"When the demonstrators reached the People's Square, armed police suppressed them using electroshock weapons and so on," he said, adding, "After that, other protests erupted in Uyghur areas of town."
A Uyghur patient at the Dosluk No. 3 Hospital said she saw at least 10 to 15 injured men there. Official CCTV television said the hospital treated more than 100 people injured in the clashes, four of whom died.
"There were Uyghurs and Chinese, but mostly Uyghurs. There were both badly injured and lightly injured. Blood was everywhere," she said.
"Riots took place in bus stations, in tourist spots, and in shopping areas. Scores of Uyghurs were killed. Armed police were carrying automatic assault rifles and machine guns. There were thousands of soldiers. It had a tremendous impact, and we won't be able to go to work for three days," another resident said, also speaking on condition of anonymity.
City 'now calm'
A police officer in Urumqi contacted by telephone early Monday said a curfew had been imposed on Uyghur areas, and residents said many shops were shuttered.
"People are dead. This might have planned by evil-minded people," the officer said.
"All the shops in the area where the riot happened were closed today," one Uyghur girl said in an interview Monday.
"I walked around the streets a while ago. There were police and soldiers in the streets. There are some Uyghurs, but no Chinese. Today, for the first time in my life, I have a feeling that Urumqi is my hometown, because there were no Chinese in the streets. I am so glad."
A shop owner in Urumqi who declined to give his name said he had had to close for business as police swarmed through the city.
"We closed our doors from last night. Armed police dispersed the protesters in about two hours. Firefighters were also dispatched and last night police were all over the city," he said in an interview Monday.
Deadly clash in June was trigger
Uyghur sources said the protest Sunday was organized online and began early July 5 with about 1,000 people but grew by thousands more during the day. They gathered to demand a probe into the deadly fight in Guangdong late last month.
In separate interviews, three Uyghur witnesses now under Chinese government protection said the fighting in Shaoguan began when Han Chinese laborers stormed the dormitories of Uyghur colleagues, beating them with clubs, bars, and machetes.
The clashes began late June 25 and lasted into the early hours of the following day. At least two people were killed and 118 injured, and witnesses said the numbers could be higher.
A number of Uyghurs have voiced anger and bitterness over the clash and accused police of doing too little, too late to stop it.
"If the government had given any explanation about the Shaoguan incident without hiding it from Uyghurs, this would not have happened in Urumqi," one Urumqi businessman said Monday.
"If the government had explained, as the demonstrators demanded, the protests would have dispersed," he said, referring to the demonstrations Sunday. "Instead, the government got heavy-handed, and this angered the people."
"Because the police took the protest leaders away, the protesters did not know what to do and acted aimlessly. If the leaders had not been captured, the demonstration would have ended peacefully. Trying to dissipate [the protest], the government only aggravated it."
Simmering resentment
Like Tibet, which erupted in protests in early 2008, the XUAR has long been home to smoldering ethnic tensions related to religion, culture, and regional economic development that residents say has disproportionately enriched and employed majority Han Chinese immigrants.
China has accused Uyghur separatists of fomenting unrest in the region, particularly in the run-up to and during the Olympics last year, when a wave of violence hit the vast desert region.
The violence prompted a crackdown in which the government says 1,295 people were detained for state security crimes, along with tighter curbs on the practice of Islam.
XUAR Party Chief Wang Lequan was quoted in China's official media as saying the fight against these forces was a "life or death struggle," and he has spoken since of the need to "strike hard" against ethnic separatism.
Activists have reported wide-scale detentions, arrests, new curbs on religious practices, travel restrictions, and stepped-up controls over free expression.
Original reporting by Mamatjan Juma, Shohret Hoshur, Medina, and Mehriban for RFA's Uyghur service and by Qiao Long for RFA's Mandarin service. Translated from the Uyghur by Mamatjan Juma and from the Mandarin by Jia Yuan. Uyghur service director: Dolkun Kamberi. Mandarin service director: Jennifer Chou. Written and produced in English by Sarah Jackson-Han. Edited by Luisetta Mudie.
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.
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Burma, North Korea Said To Expand Military Ties
Also on www.rfa.org:
Hong Kong's Lyrical Lament www.rfa.org/english/news/complain-07012009112410.html
BANGKOK-A leaked report purportedly drafted by authorities in Burma's military government describes a top-secret visit to North Korea late last year by Burma's top brass, during which the two sides pledged to significantly expand cooperation in military training and arms production, Radio Free Asia (RFA) reports.
The 37-page report in Burmese claims to contain details of a Nov. 22-29 visit to North Korea by 17 Burmese officials, billed as a goodwill visit to China and reportedly led by Gen. Thura Shwe Mann, Burma's third-ranked leader and armed forces chief of staff.
It also contains 118 photos said to have been taken in North Korea and 64 said to have been taken in China, from which the group was said to have traveled to North Korea.
Photographs in the report show a Burmese delegation in uniform in China but in civilian clothing in North Korea, suggesting a bid to keep the visit to North Korea low-profile.
Exile Burmese media have voiced alarm in recent days at reports of growing ties between Burma and nuclear-armed North Korea, both highly reclusive pariah states targeted by international sanctions, and have warned that this warming relationship indicates Burma's own nuclear ambitions.
The report is titled "Report of the High-Level Burmese Military delegation led by SPDC member and Military Chief General Thura Shwe Mann to the DPRK [Democratic People's Republic of Korea] and the PRC [People's Republic of China] from Nov. 21-Dec. 2, 2008."
SPDC, denoting the State Peace and Development Council, is the Burmese junta's formal name.
The report says the delegation left Burma's remote new capital, Naypyidaw, on a special aircraft Nov. 21 at the invitation of Chinese Defense Ministry Central Commission member and armed forces Chief of Staff Gen. Chen Bingde and North Korean Defense Ministry Chief of General Staff Gen. Kim Kyok Sik.
The report was transmitted to RFA's Burmese service through a knowledgeable source in Burma's former capital, Rangoon.
Out in the cold
The report surfaced just as both regimes find themselves farther out in the wilderness than ever before.
North Korea recently launched a long-range missile over Japan and conducted a second nuclear test, prompting a new round of U.N. sanctions and an international outcry, even from longtime allies in Moscow and Beijing. It test-fired four short-range missiles on Tuesday.
Burma has meanwhile brought a bizarre criminal case against detained opposition leader and Nobel Peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi and renewed a military offensive against ethnic rebels in the east, forcing thousands to seek refuge in Thailand.
Over the last week, U.S. officials tracked a North Korean ship, the Kang Nam I, suspected of heading toward Burma with illicit weapons on board in violation of new U.N. sanctions. The ship turned around and headed back north on Sunday.
The Bangkok-based Swedish journalist Bertil Lintner, an authority on North Korea, said the report may have been fabricated and leaked to discredit the Burmese exile press. But he added that it could also indicate "there are people within the military establishment not very happy with its cooperation with North Korea."
If the latter is true, "They leaked the information in order to make it known to the international community, especially the U.N. Security Council, which has imposed sanctions on new North Korea arm exports," Lintner said.
Htay Aung, a researcher at the Thai-based Burmese opposition group Network for Democracy and Development, said he believed the report was authentic, and either sold by mid- to low-level officers or leaked by opponents of cooperation with Pyongyang.
The latter group "seems unhappy with projects to equip the military with costly weapons and technologies as the country goes deeper into poverty," Htay Aung said.
Aim to modernize
The stated aim of the visit was "to modernize the Burmese military and increase its capabilities through visiting and studying the militaries" of China and North Korea.
The group reportedly included Gen. Thura Shwe Mann, Lt. Gen. Myint Hlaing (anti-air defense chief), Maj. General Hla Htay Win (training), Maj. General Khin Aung Myint (air force), Maj. General Thein Htay (vice chief of staff, ordnance), Maj. Gen. Mya Win (munitions), Brig. Gen. Hla Myint (tanks), Brig. Gen. Kyaw Nyunt (military communications), Brig. Gen. Nyan Tun (engineering), and staff officers.
After signing a Memorandum of Understanding with the North Korean side on Nov. 27, according to the report, the Burmese delegation deemed the visit a success. The report concludes:
"1. The two militaries will cooperate in the teaching and training of military science. The Burmese military will focus on studying special forces training, military security training, training in tunnel warfare, air defense training, and language training for both countries. 2. The two militaries will cooperate in the building of tunnels for aircraft and ships as well as other underground military installations. The two countries will cooperate to modernize military arms and equipment and will exchange experiences on such matters. As such, the objective and aim of the high-level visit is deemed to be successful."
The report makes reference to several appendices that are omitted from the text obtained by RFA.
Outings and visits
A detailed account in the report includes discussions with North Korean Chief of General Staff Gen. Kim Kyok Sik, visits to weapons and radar factories, and a missile launch site.
About one-quarter of the report is devoted to comparing the Chinese and North Korean militaries. It makes no specific mention of any actual or planned military purchases.
The report says the Burmese delegation was shown North Korean surface-to-air missiles and rockets, along with naval and air defense systems and tunnel construction, including how Pyongyang stores aircraft and ships underground to protect them from aerial attack.
It also describes a Nov. 23 visit to North Korea's National Air Defense Control Center and a Nov. 24 visit to a North Korean naval unit in Nampo.
Subsequent outings included tours of an armored division of the North Korean Aerial Defense Corps, the AA Weapons & Rockets Factory, and three underground missile factories, according to the report.
North Korean officials also showed the Burmese delegation the USS Pueblo warship, seized by North Korea in 1968 and now docked in the North Korean capital, Pyongyang.
The tour included visits to Pyongyang and to Myohyang, where the government has dug secret tunnels to store jet aircraft, missiles, tanks, and weapons.
The delegation also visited a Scud tactical ballistic missile factory outside Pyongyang, the report said. Pyongyang has since the 1980s been a major supplier of Scud missiles to Iran, Egypt, and Syria.
Market for North Korea
Another recent report by Lintner, the Swedish journalist, claims that North Korean engineers have been actively building a vast network of underground tunnels in Burma.
Lintner, author of Blood Brothers: The Criminal Underworld of Asia and Great Leader, Dear Leader: Demystifying North Korea under the Kim Clan, reported that the Burmese junta began tunnel construction with North Korean assistance as early as 2005, when the country's capital was moved to Naypyidaw from Rangoon.
Lintner said he regards the report as further evidence of deepening ties between Burma and North Korea, with China-unwilling to sell arms to Burma for fear of alienating major powers-now playing the role of broker.
North Korea is likely looking for new arms buyers now that its arms sales to Libya and Pakistan have dried up, he said.
"North Korea has a lot of things to offer, and they are willing to sell anyone who can pay for it," Lintner said. "They are looking for a new customer. And Burma seems to be the perfect one."
Original reporting by Kyaw Min Htun for RFA's Burmese service. Translated by Soe Thinn. Burmese service director: Nancy Shwe. Executive producer: Susan Lavery. 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.
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WASHINGTON, June 11, 2009--Four men belonging to the mostly Muslim Uyghur ethnic group and held by the United States at Guantanamo Bay for more than seven years have been released and landed early Thursday in Bermuda, Radio Free Asia (RFA) reports.
The four men, part of a larger group of 17 Uyghurs detained after the 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States, landed on the tiny North Atlantic island at about 5:30 a.m., according to Ilshat Helenian, vice president of the Uyghur American Association.
The four released men were identified as Abdulla Abduqadir, 30; Helil Mamut, 31; Ablikim Turahun, 38; and Salahidin Ablehet, 32. The location of the remaining 13 Uyghurs wasn't immediately clear.
Most of the 17 Muslims from China's remote northwestern Xinjiang province held at the controversial detention facility for suspected terrorists were cleared more than four years ago of being "enemy combatants."
The Uyghurs were living in a self-contained camp in Afghanistan when the U.S.-led bombing campaign began in October 2001 as part of the military after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States.
They fled to the mountains, but were turned over to Pakistani authorities, who then handed them over to the United States.
The Chinese government says the men are members of the outlawed East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM), which Beijing and Washington regard as a terrorist organization. Beijing blames ETIM for a series of violent attacks inside China in recent years.
Rights advocates argued against returning them to China for fear they would face torture there.
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. RFAs 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.
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Radio Free Asia (RFA)
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Paint-Throwing at Mao's Portrait Born of Frustration, 1989 Protester Says
Go to www.rfa.org/english/news/special/june4/
for news, essays, and never before released videos and photos of the 1989 protests
WASHINGTON-China has developed tremendously over the last two decades, but "in terms of political and democratic reforms" the system is unchanged, one of three men jailed for splattering paint on Chairman Mao Zedong's portrait during the 1989 Tiananmen protests has told Radio Free Asia (RFA).
Yu Zhijian, who along with fellow paint-thrower Yu Dongyue was just granted U.S. asylum, described their high-profile May 23, 1989 act of vandalism as a product of frustration directed at the Chinese authorities and prompted by the failure of protest leaders to devise a response when Beijing declared martial law.
"Before we resorted to the violent behavior, we tried to communicate to the student leaders our assessment of the situation," Yu Zhijian told RFA's Mandarin service in his first interview since arriving in the United States in mid-May.
"We felt, as participants in the movement, that there should have been a plan in response to the martial law."
"The day after we arrived in Beijing, we joined the crowd that tried to block the PLA [People's Liberation Army] vehicles from entering the city. We talked to the students and ordinary citizens. I felt that they didn't know where the movement was headed," he said.
"As there wasn't to be a 'triumphant withdrawal,' the leaders of the movement should have come up with relatively decisive responses. So we proposed three suggestions," he said, including a nationwide strike and a takeover of several key buildings.
But on May 21, "when we brought our three suggestions to the Square we didn't see any student leaders. So we gave our proposal to someone whose job was to maintain order at the Square...After that, the movement wasn't headed in the direction that we had hoped," he said.
Turned over to police
And two days later, "We decided to smear Mao's portrait with eggs containing paint. In our view, the rule by the Chinese Communists from 1949-89 was a Maoist dictatorship," Yu said.
"The portrait of Mao Zedong symbolized the dictatorship of the Chinese Communist Party. We had hoped that our action would lead the participants of the movement to change course and bring the movement back from the brink of failure."
The two childhood friends-along with a bus driver named Lu Decheng-hurled 30 eggs filled with paint at the portrait and were quickly seized by student protesters eager to distance themselves from the act and handed over to police.
Less than two weeks later, Chinese troops moved in on the protests with tanks and live ammunition, killing hundreds of people and prompting an international outcry. An official blackout on discussion of the crackdown remains in force, 20 years later.
"China has witnessed huge changes in the past 20 years. But in terms of political and democratic reforms, it is where it was 20 years ago. There has been no change whatsoever," he said.
Mental health damaged
Yu Dongyue¸ a former journalist and art critic, was convicted of sabotage and counter-revolutionary propaganda and handed a 20-year jail term. Lu received a 16-year jail term, and Yu Zhijian, a former teacher, drew a life sentence.
Lu and Yu Zhijian were paroled in 1998 but Yu Dongyue remained in custody because, officials said, he had never confessed to any wrongdoing. His sentence was cut by two years in 2000 and another 15 months in 2003.
Yu Dongyue is the longest-serving known political prisoner sentenced in connection with the 1989 crackdown. He spent several years in solitary confinement and was subjected to beatings and electric shocks, and friends and relatives say his mental health has suffered severely.
During an interview here, Yu Dongyue appeared vacant. He spoke haltingly and was unable to answer direct questions.
"As you can see, his mental condition is awful, just awful," Yu Zhijian said. "Yu Dongyue spent 17 years in prison. When he was released he was a shadow of his former self. My heart ached when I saw him."
Lu was granted asylum in Canada in 2006. Yu Dongyue and Yu Zhijian fled China through Thailand and were granted U.S. asylum last month.
Neither man would discuss the route they took to escape China, but Yu Zhijian notably cited Chinese-born human rights activist Harry Wu and his Laogai Foundation, for their assistance.
Asked how he regarded the 20th anniversary on Thursday of the June 4, 1989 crackdown, he replied:
"My heart is heavy with memories of June 4th. These memories will never be erased from my mind. It is a topic that pains me to bring up, especially when the June 4th anniversary is upon us. I am unable to sleep or eat. My mind is in turmoil. The movement 20 years ago was a noble one and it changed our lives."
"The participants were not limited to university students. The general public-in the millions-also took part in it. In our hometown in Hunan, even the peasants stopped working in the fields. They were glued to the television. They were inspired by the patriotism and democratic spirit of the students."
Original reporting by He Ping for RFA's Mandarin service. Translated by RFA Mandarin service director Jennifer Chou. 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.
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Sarah Jackson-Han
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Radio Free Asia (RFA)
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202 907 4613 m
Zhao Ziyang Tapes Reveal Call for Democracy
For more, go to www.rfa.org <http://www.rfa.org>
HONG KONG, May 14, 2009-Twenty years after the People's Liberation Army crushed the student-led pro-democracy movement in China with guns and tanks, a former top Communist Party official has released audio recordings in which former premier Zhao Ziyang calls for parliamentary democracy for China, Radio Frede Asia (RFA) reports.
Zhao, who fell into political disgrace in the wake of the crackdown, described it in recordings as "a tragedy to shock the world, which was happening in spite of attempts to avert it."
He recalls hearing the sound of "intense gunfire" on the evening of June 3, 1989 while sitting at his Beijing home, where he was held under house arrest until his death. He concludes in extracts read from an unpublished political memoir that the only way forward for China is a parliamentary democracy.
"Of course, it is possible that in the future a more advanced political system than parliamentary democracy will emerge," Zhao said. "But that is a matter for the future. At present, there is no other."
He said China could not have a healthy economic system, nor become a modern society with the rule of law without democracy.
"Instead, it will run into the situations that have occurred in so many developing countries, including China: the commercialization of power, rampant corruption, and a society polarized between rich and poor."
Released by aide
Zhao's former political aide, Bao Tong, who served a seven-year jail term in the wake of the crackdown, released the tapes ahead of the 20th anniversary of the violent suppression of the 1989 student movement, in which hundreds, perhaps more than 1,000, died.
"Zhao Ziyang left behind a set of audio recordings. These are his legacy," Bao wrote to RFA's Mandarin service from under house arrest at his Beijing home.
"Zhao Ziyang's legacy is for all of China's people. It is my job to transmit them to the world in the form of words and to arrange things," he said.
"Their contents have implications for a history that is still influencing the people of China to this day. The key theme of this history is reform," Bao said.
Authorities in Beijing suppressed any public displays of grief for Zhao in the days after his death on Jan. 17, 2005, detaining dozens of people for wearing white flowers in his honor or attempting to pay their respects at the former premier's home.
Zhao was openly mourned by thousands in the former British colony of Hong Kong, however, where is seen by many as a symbol of the territory's own struggle for political change.
Educating China's youth
Bao said his purpose in releasing the tapes, which he described as "political task," was partly to educate a whole generation of young people in China who had never heard of Zhao Ziyang.
"On the mainland at the current time, this part of history has been sealed off and distorted, so it will be useful to discuss some of this history for younger readers."
"The name of Zhao Ziyang was erased from news media, books and periodicals, and the historical record within China," Bao wrote in a six-part essay accompanying the tapes, titled "The Historical Background to the Zhao Ziyang Recordings."
"Zhao wanted to address the issues of official corruption and democracy which were the concerns of most ordinary Chinese people, using the principle of the rule of law," Bao wrote of the conflict between his former political mentor and late supreme leader Deng Xiaoping.
"He wanted to instigate reforms of China's political system alongside deepening economic reforms, concentrating the attention of the whole of society onto the issue of reforms."
The Chinese authorities have already begun tightening security in and around Beijing ahead of the sensitive anniversary.
Articles and forum posts connected in any way to the events of 20 years ago are being deleted regularly from Chinese cyberspace, including an appeal for the rehabilitation of Zhao and Hu Yaobang, whose death on April 15, 1989 triggered the student movement.
Original reporting by RFA's Mandarin service. Mandarin service director: Jennifer Chou. Translated and written 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.
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Radio Free Asia (RFA)
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Burmese Medicines Sickened Refugee Children
Also on www.rfa.org:
Loyal Burmese Businessmen Urged To Run in 2010 Polls
www.rfa.org/english/news/burma/business-03312009123802.html
Tibetan Monk Beaten to Death
www.rfa.org/english/news/tibet/monk-death-03302009161540.html
U.S. health officials have found lead and arsenic in traditional Burmese
medications used by refugee families. Are children back in Burma also
affected?
BANGKOK and WASHINGTON, March 31, 2009-Burmese children in the United
States who took two commonly used household medications from Burma were
found to have high levels of lead and arsenic in their blood, Radio Free
Asia (RFA) reports.
The poisoning was discovered in 32 Burmese refugee children who were
resettled in Fort Wayne, Indiana, in the United States from refugee
camps in Thailand.
"All refugees are tested when they come into the country for several
things," said Loraine Hagerty, special projects manager of the St.
Joseph Community Health Foundation, which has been helping the Fort
Wayne refugees.
"It was found that there were a number of Burmese refugee children who
had tested positive for lead poisoning," said Hagerty, whose
organization works closely with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention (CDC) to run the tests.
"And when additional tests were conducted on their arrival in Indiana,
we found more instances of lead poisoning amongst the Burmese refugee
children," she told RFA's Burmese service.
Indiana-based Burmese doctor Khin Mar Oo said follow-up tests were
currently under way on the affected children.
Homes surveyed
"When tests were conducted by the schools, they found that the lead
levels in the Burmese refugee children were quite high," Khin Mar Oo,
who runs an organization helping Burmese refugees in Fort Wayne, said.
"At first it was thought that these lead levels were brought about
during their stay on the Thai-Burma border," she said.
"But then they found that ... not only were the lead levels high in the
Burmese refugee children who had come from Thailand, but also in some of
the refugee children born in the U.S."
Health-care workers and medical experts from the CDC visited the homes
of the affected children in early February to look for clues in their
environment, diet, and medications.
Tests on building materials and drinking water yielded no evidence of
lead or arsenic, so experts began questioning the children about their
daily routines, Hagerty said.
"We actually went from door to door and asked them a lot of questions
about the products that they use in their homes, habits that their
children have, what they drink and eat and what kinds of medication they
took, taking samples of their medication and testing them at the
laboratories," she said.
Children's medicine pinpointed
The source of the lead and arsenic was finally narrowed down to two
types of Burmese medicine called "Daw Tway" and "Daw Kyin" medicines,
specifically aimed at children. The two medicines are commonly used in
rural households all over Burma.
An official who answered the phone in the national food and drug
administration of Burma's Health Ministry said he was unaware of the
problem.
"[We] did not pass those medicines," he said. "Maybe it went through the
department of indigenous medicines."
U Tin Nyunt, director general of Burma's department of indigenous
medicines, said the remedies could have come out before 2007.
"I don't think these medicines are what we have on the market today," he
said.
"They are most likely to be medicines from earlier times ... We have
machines that can test heavy metals in medicines, and if they are found
in medicines we will revoke the production license of the producer," he
said.
'No announcements' heard
But he said he had been unable to crack down on substandard medications
produced before he took office.
"Since I took over responsibility here we have absolutely not permitted
this at all," he said. "We are doing all of this within the policies and
regulations."
The packaging on the two medicines found among the Burmese refugees in
Indiana was dated September 2007.
A housewife based in the former capital, Rangoon, said she had seen no
media reports concerning these medicines.
"People living in rural areas, especially the parents of children, are
still using these medicines," she said. "They are still selling these
medicines."
Cheap alternative
"There have been no announcements with regard to these medicines. When I
heard this, I was quite alarmed because the children depend on these
medicines," she said.
These traditional remedies, at about 50 kyat (a few U.S. cents), were
far cheaper than a visit to a clinic or hospital, which could run into
thousands of kyat, she said.
A total of 12,000 children have been diagnosed with lead poisoning among
refugee communities in the U.S. states of Indiana, Illinois, Kentucky,
Ohio, Michigan, and Missouri, according to health sources.
The CDC is expected to release a detailed report next month on the
reasons for the lead poisoning among U.S. refugee families.
Common problem
Issues such as this are not uncommon among refugees, said Steve Weil,
co-founder of the Virginia-based nonprofit Coalition for Environmentally
Safe Communities.
"There are any number of these products," said Weil, whose organization
is working with Denver-based Mercy Housing to conduct workshops aimed at
educating U.S. health and refugee workers around the country about lead
poisoning.
The workshops are funded by the U.S. Health and Human Services
department. The last of three workshops is scheduled for April 2 in
Indianapolis, Weil said.
Remedies originating abroad are often inconsistent in their lead
content, with one batch containing toxic lead levels and another with
little or none, Weil said.
Original reporting by Nyi Nyi and Kyaw Min Htun for RFA's Burmese
service. Translated by Soe Thinn. Burmese service director: Nancy Shwe.
Executive producer: Susan Lavery. Written and produced in English by
Luisetta Mudie and 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.
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Sarah Jackson-Han
News Director, English
Radio Free Asia (RFA)
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202 907 4613 m
Chinese Dissident's Family Defects
Also on www.rfa.org <http://www.rfa.org>
North Korean Bans Foreign Cars
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Mental Health Cases Sweep China
www.rfa.org/english/news/china/health-03112009153434.html
Buddha Images Stolen in Laos
www.rfa.org/english/news/laos/laosstolenartifacts-03092009170008.html
WASHINGTON, March 12, 2009-The wife and children of a top civil rights
lawyer under close surveillance by the Chinese authorities have arrived
in the United States after walking across the border to Thailand, Gao
Zhisheng's wife Geng He has told Radio Free Asia (RFA).
Geng said her daughter, 15, and son, 5, had suffered "great hardship" in
China from living under virtual house arrest in their Beijing home.
"I left China because my family had been under tight surveillance for a
long time. We experienced-in our careers and daily life-great hardship
and difficulty," Geng told RFA's Mandarin service in her first interview
since arriving in the United States on March 11 to seek asylum.
"My daughter was unable to attend school. Because she was unable to
attend school, she tried to commit suicide several times," Geng said. "I
had no place to turn. So I fled with my children."
Geng said she had left a note for Gao, an Army veteran who lost his law
license after he criticized the government for its treatment of the
banned Falun Gong spiritual movement.
Gao began a rolling hunger strike among fellow civil rights activists to
protest the ill-treatment of lawyers and rights activists at the hands
of police and local government officials.
"I left a note for my husband that I was leaving with the children,"
Geng said.
"I said in my note that our daughter is miserable because she couldn't
attend school. I said I was miserable and I had to take the kids and
leave," said Geng, in tears.
Dangerous route through Thailand
Geng and her children left China on Jan. 9 and arrived in Thailand on
Jan. 16, leaving for the United States on March 10.
Describing the family's dramatic escape, Geng said they first left
Beijing very quietly, unnoticed by the state security police who usually
followed them.
"We could not travel by air. We took a train," Geng said, adding that
Gao was unable to accompany them because he couldn't throw off the
police on his tail.
"Eventually, with the help of friends, we freed ourselves from police
surveillance and we walked to another country," she said.
Geng said friends who helped her leave China were members of the banned
Falun Gong spiritual movement.
"We walked day and night. It was extremely hard. I did not even know the
names of some of the towns we passed through."
"It was extraordinarily difficult to get us out of China. The friends
who helped us escape took enormous pains, some even risking their own
lives," Geng said.
She said she hadn't been in touch with Gao since leaving China.
"On Feb. 4, when we had arrived in the second country, I heard from a
friend that he had been detained. I am very worried," said Geng, who has
no idea of Gao's whereabouts.
'Very fragile state'
Now in the United States, Geng said she has few specific plans.
"The first step is to get here and to give my daughter a chance to heal
her mental scars," she said.
"She is in a very fragile state. When she feels better, I will arrange
for her to get an education. It's important to get an education."
She said her son asked repeatedly for Gao, and whether his father had
been sent to prison again.
Gao's whereabouts remained unclear for months after he was subjected to
a secret trial by the authorities on unspecified subversion charges in
2006.
Lauded by China's own Justice Ministry as one of China's Top 10 lawyers
in 2001 for his pro bono work in helping poor people sue government
officials over corruption and mistreatment, Gao was once a member of the
ruling Chinese Communist Party. He resigned from the Party in 2005.
Gao's fortunes took a sharp downturn after he wrote an open letter to
President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao in October 2005 urging them
to end the persecution of Falun Gong practitioners, detailing a range of
abuses they suffer in custody, including torture, beatings, and
execution.
Report on abuses
In its most recent report on human rights around the world, the U.S.
State Department noted that Gao's whereabouts remained unknown.
It also noted the authorities had revoked the professional licenses of
several prominent lawyers, including Gao and of Teng Biao, who offered
to represent Tibetans taken into custody for their role in the March
2008 Tibetan uprising in Lhasa.
"Government-employed lawyers often refused to represent defendants in
politically sensitive cases, and defendants frequently found it
difficult to find an attorney," the report said.
"Officials deployed a wide range of tactics to obstruct the work of
lawyers representing sensitive clients, including unlawful detentions,
disbarment, intimidation, refusal to allow a case to be tried before a
court, and physical abuse."
Original reporting in Mandarin by Tang Qiwei. Mandarin service director:
Jennifer Chou. Written for the Web in English. 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
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Sarah Jackson-Han
News Director, English
Radio Free Asia (RFA)
jacksonhans(a)rfa.org
202 530 7774 w
202 907 4613 m
Lawyer for Guantanamo Bay Uyghurs Vows To Fight
Also on www.rfa.org <http://www.rfa.org>
Defiant Vietnamese Cyber-Dissident Freed
www.rfa.org/english/news/vietnam/release-02182009154739.html
Khmer Rouge Trial Lawyers Clash
www.rfa.org/english/news/cambodia/hearing-02192009121437.html
WASHINGTON-The lead lawyer for 17 ethnic Uyghurs held for years at
Guantanamo Bay in Cuba is vowing to fight a new legal order keeping the
men in U.S. military custody and is calling on U.S. President Barack
Obama to free them quickly, Radio Free Asia (RFA) reports.
"We are bloodied but unbowed. We will fight this," Sabin Willet, who
represents the 17 Uyghurs-Muslims from China's northwestern Xinjiang
region-said in a telephone interview on his way back from visiting the
men at Guantanamo Bay.
"Precisely what our next legal filing will be we have not decided, but
the courts have not heard the last from us," said Willet, who spent all
day Thursday with the detainees and translator Rushan Abbas at
Guantanamo.
"There is a mechanism for seeking further review in the Court of
Appeals, and the Supreme Court is a second option."
On Wednesday, a three-judge panel from the U.S. Court of Appeals
reversed an earlier ruling that the Uyghurs-who have been cleared of the
terrorism charges on which they were initially detained-must be released
in the United States.
The panel said a federal judge who ordered the men released into the
United States in October 2008 lacks the authority to make such a ruling,
and that only the executive branch can make such a determination.
The Uyghurs have remained at Guantanamo because the United States has
been unable to find a country willing to take them and won't return them
to China because they would face persecution there.
Albania, which took in five other Uyghurs in 2006 after they were
released from Guantanamo, has balked at welcoming the others-apparently
fearing reprisals from Beijing.
The 17 detainees "are deeply disappointed and frustrated," Willet said.
"They were a few hours from freedom on Oct. 9... This is a long time to
be in a military prison. There is deep disappointment and frustration
among these men."
"At the same time we mean to remind President Obama every day that this
is his problem. The court concluded that the courts can't solve this
problem, and that's wrong, but that's what they concluded," Willet said.
Obama "can solve this problem, and he should do it, and he should do it
tomorrow morning," he said.
Willet said his clients were being held in better conditions recently,
with military officials "working hard in the last two weeks to arrange
calls" between the detainees and their families.
The Uyghur detainees resettled in Albania have tried to send letters to
the Uyghurs still held at Guantanamo, he said, although whether they
reached Guantanamo was unclear. He also said his request for a phone
call to his clients from the Uyghurs in Albania hasn't been met.
Previous order
The Obama administration has vowed to close Guantanamo within a year but
hasn't decided what to do with the 245 detainees still held in custody
there.
U.S. District Judge Ricardo Urbina ruled in October that there was no
evidence the detainees were "enemy combatants" or a security risk and
ordered them freed to live with Uyghur families in the United States.
The Chinese government says the men are members of the outlawed East
Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM), which Beijing and Washington regard
as a terrorist organization. Beijing blames ETIM for a series of violent
attacks inside China in recent years.
Uyghurs twice enjoyed short-lived independence after declaring the state
of East Turkestan during the 1930s and 40s, and many oppose Beijing's
rule in the region. Chinese officials have said Uyghur extremists
plotted terrorist strikes during the Beijing Olympics.
Original reporting by Sarah Jackson-Han in Washington.
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
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Burmese Prisoners Killed After Cyclone
Burmese guards beat prisoners and deprived them of food after a riot
following last year's cyclone. A group of survivors was sentenced on
Jan. 11 to additional terms of 2-12 years.
Also on www.rfa.org <http://www.rfa.org>
Asian Women in their own words www.rfa.org/english/news/women
<http://www.rfa.org/english/news/women>
BANGKOK-Guards at Burma's Insein Prison beat scores of inmates following
a disturbance nine months ago, according to sources who asked not to be
named. Nine of the prisoners later died from their injuries, Radio Free
Asia (RFA) reports.
The beatings occurred during questioning aimed at identifying prisoners
who rioted after the prison was damaged by Cyclone Nargis. After being
beaten, the men were denied water for four days and food for 11 days.
"They told us they would give us food if we confessed," a prisoner said.
"But even after some confessed, we didn't get any food. Then, 11 days
later, we began to receive a spoonful of rice puree twice a day."
Rioting at Insein Prison broke out after the prison was pummeled by
Cyclone Nargis beginning around midnight on May 2. The storm tore zinc
roofs off some of the prison's colonial-era buildings and left prisoners
exposed for several hours to heavy rains and wind, according to RFA's
Burmese service.
Frustrated at the long delay in being moved, prisoners in storm-damaged
Halls No. 3 and 4 threatened to break out of their cells. Then, as
prisoners in the damaged buildings were being relocated, the assistant
warden and more than 20 armed guards began to argue with the prisoners
and fired gunshots into the air.
"One of the bullets hit an iron bar, ricocheted off the wall, and hit a
prisoner named Thein San in the chest," a prisoner said. "The rest of
the prisoners tried to hide, and some of the younger prisoners in Hall
No. 8 started a fire."
Suspects questioned, beaten
Authorities then moved prisoners suspected of taking part in the
disturbance to a central part of the prison, where they were questioned
and beaten on their heads and backs, sources said.
Prisoners who were beaten included Wai Moe, Khin Kyaw, Soe Kyaw Kyaw,
Tun Lin Aung, and Aye Min Oo, according to friends of the men's
families.Interrogations continued for several weeks and ended with 103
prisoners identified as rioters, with 41 identified as key leaders.
On Jan. 11, a special court inside Insein handed down sentences of two
years each to 28 participants in the riot. Wai Moe and six others were
given 12 years each for arson, damaging public property, and leading the
riot, according to sources close to the trial and the prisoners.
But Thailand-based Assistance Association for Political Prisoners
(Burma) spokesman Bo Kyi said that it is the prison authorities
themselves who should have been charged with crimes.
"Under international conventions, beatings and other forms of torture
should not be used as punishments in prison procedure," he said.
"The perpetrators of such beatings should be convicted for their
actions. If they are not, we must assume that torturing prisoners is
state policy."
Original reporting in Burmese by Kyaw Min Htun. Burmese service
director: Nancy Shwe. Executive producer: Susan Lavery. Written for the
Web in English by Richard Finney.
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 #####
Joshua Lipes
Online Copy Editor
Radio Free Asia
2025 M Street, NW
Washington DC, 20036
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