Attacks on the Press - Committee to Protect Journalists

attacks on the press in 2009journalists in prison: chinaous damage to China-EU relations,” accordingto The Associated Press.In October 2008, Hu was transferredto the Beijing Municipal Prison,according to Zeng’s blog. He raisedhuman rights issues in jail, promptingsecurity officials to cut off familyvisitation rights from November 2008to February 2009, according to onlinenews reports. Zeng reported that Hu’shealth was deteriorating and that theprison did not have facilities to treathis liver condition.Human Rights Watch awarded Hua Hellman/Hammett grant for persecutedwriters in October 2009.Dhondup WangchenFilming for TibetIMPRISONED: March 26, 2008Police in Tongde, Qinghai province,arrested Wangchen, a Tibetan documentaryfilmmaker, shortly after hesent footage filmed in Tibet to colleagues,according to the productioncompany, Filming for Tibet. A 25-minute film titled “Jigdrel” (LeavingFear Behind) was produced from thetapes. Wangchen’s assistant, JigmeGyatso, was also arrested, once inMarch 2008, and again in March 2009after speaking out about his treatmentin prison, Filming for Tibet said.Filming for Tibet was founded inSwitzerland by Gyaljong Tsetrin, arelative of Wangchen, who left Tibetin 2002 but maintained contactwith people there. Tsetrin told CPJthat he had spoken to Wangchen onMarch 25, 2008, but that he had lostcontact after that. He learned of thedetention only later, after speaking bytelephone with relatives.Filming for the documentary wascompleted shortly before peaceful protestsagainst Chinese rule of Tibet deterioratedinto riots in Lhasa and inTibetan areas of China in March2008. The filmmakers had gone to Tibetto ask ordinary people about theirlives under Chinese rule in the run-upto the Olympics.The arrests were first publicizedwhen the documentary was launchedin August 2008 before a small groupof foreign reporters in a hotel roomin Beijing on August 6. A secondscreening was interrupted by hotelmanagement, according to Reuters.Officials in Xining, Qinghai province,charged the filmmaker with incitingseparatism and replaced theTibetan’s own lawyer with a governmentappointee in July 2009, accordingto international reports. The filmcompany said a closed trial had begunin late 2009, but no results were reportedby late year.Wangchen was born in Qinghai butmoved to Lhasa as a young man, accordingto his biography. He had recentlyrelocated with his wife, LhamoTso, and four children to Dharamsala,India, before returning to Tibetto begin filming, according to areport published in October 2008 bythe South China Morning Post.Tsetrin told CPJ that Wangchen’s assistant,Gyatso, was arrested on March23, 2008. Gyatso, released on October15, 2008, later described having beenbrutally beaten by interrogators duringhis seven months in detention, accordingto Filming in Tibet. The Dharamsala-basedTibetan Centre for HumanRights and Democracy reported thatGyatso was rearrested in March 2009and released the next month.Chen Daojun, freelanceIMPRISONED: May 9, 2008Police arrested Chen in Sichuan provinceshortly after he had been involvedin a “strolling” nonviolent protestagainst a proposed petrochemicalplant in Chengdu, the capital of Sichuanprovince, according to EnglishandChinese-language news reports.In November 2008, he was foundguilty of inciting subversion againstthe state, according to internationalnews reports. He was sentenced tothree years in prison.Prosecutors introduced three articlesby Chen to demonstrate apurportedly antigovernment stance,according to the Independent ChinesePEN Center. In one piece, anarticle for the Hong Kong-based politicalmagazine Zheng Ming, Chenportrayed antigovernment protestsin Tibet in a positive light. That article,first published in April 2008,was reposted on overseas Web sites.He also published an online articleobjecting to the Chengdu project, butit was not among the articles cited bythe prosecution.Huang Qi, 6-4tianwangIMPRISONED: June 10, 2008The Web site 6-4tianwang reportedthat its founder, Qi, had been forcedinto a car along with two friends onJune 10, 2008. On June 18, news reportssaid police had detained himand charged him with illegally holdingstate secrets.In the aftermath of the Sichuanearthquake in May 2008, Huang’s sitereported on the shoddy constructionof schools that collapsed during thequake, killing hundreds of children,and on efforts to help victims of thedisaster. His arrest came shortly afterthe Web site reported the detention ofacademic Zeng Hongling, who postedcritical articles about earthquake reliefon overseas Web sites.Huang was denied access to a lawyeruntil September 23, 2008. Oneof his defense lawyers, Mo Shaoping,told reporters that Huang had beenquestioned about earthquake-relatedreports and photos on the Web siteimmediately after his arrest, but thatthe state secrets charge stemmed fromdocuments saved on his computer. Hesaid that his client was deprived ofsleep during a 24-hour interrogationsession after his June arrest.Huang pleaded not guilty in closedproceedings at Chengdu Wuhou DistrictCourt on August 5, 2009. Policearrested a defense witness to preventhim from testifying on Huang’s behalf,according to the New York-based advocacygroup Human Rights in China.3083 0 9