Annual Report on the Situation of Human Rights Defenders in China ...

<strong>Annual</strong> <strong>Report</strong> on the Situation of Human Rights Defenders in China (2009)April 26, 2010That the Chinese government insists on controlling the medium and message of humanrights education comes as no surprise, given its continued efforts to restrict freedom ofexpression and association. However, by prohibiting the involvement of civil society, theChinese government is actively preventing its citizens from acquiring the most up-to-dateand useful information regarding their rights, as it is the abuses of these rights by thegovernment that civil society is best suited to help citizens defend. A governmentcontrolledplan of “human rights education,” like a government-controlled media, servesonly to further the interests of the authorities.B. Failure to protect human rights defenders1. Everyone has the right, individually and in association with others, toparticipate in peaceful activities against violations of human rights andfundamental freedoms.2. The State shall take all necessary measures to ensure the protection by thecompetent authorities of everyone, individually and in association with others,against any violence, threats, retaliation, de facto or de jure adversediscrimination, pressure or any other arbitrary action as a consequence of his orher legitimate exercise of the rights referred to in the present Declaration.3. In this connection, everyone is entitled, individually and in association withothers, to be protected effectively under national law in reacting against oropposing, through peaceful means, activities and acts, including those byomission, attributable to States that result in violations of human rights andfundamental freedoms, as well as acts of violence perpetrated by groups orindividuals that affect the enjoyment of human rights and fundamental freedoms.”- Declaration on Human Rights Defenders, Article 12In the past year, government officials not only failed to protect citizens’ right toparticipate in peaceful activities protesting violations of human rights, they themselveswere the prime persecutors of human rights defenders. Human rights defenderscontinued to be subjected to surveillance, threats, physical violence, Re-educationthrough Labor, arbitrary detention, and imprisonment in 2009. Furthermore, because ofthe large number of “sensitive” events that occurred in 2009, the government reliedparticularly heavily on “soft detention” and “forced travel” to prevent human rightsdefenders from taking any public actions to draw attention to rights abuses during theseperiods.In Part I of this report, we provided a look at the government’s efforts to prevent humanrights defenders from exercising specific rights in 2009. In this section, we will examinethe different ways in which the government retaliated against human rights defenders,and the effects of these actions.1. Harassment and threats from police and officials35