China court upholds 11-year sentence of activist who made daring call for political reform

China upholds sentence of man who demanded reform

BEIJING — A Chinese court on Thursday upheld the unprecedented 11-year sentence of a prominent academic who called for political reform — the latest in a rash of harsh punishments for activists that underscore Beijing’s refusal to brook any dissent.

The ruling — the third legal defeat this week for veteran Chinese activists — drew a rare public rebuke from the U.S. ambassador, who said Liu Xiaobo should be released immediately.

Liu’s hearing at Beijing’s high court took less than 10 minutes, and the activist was not given a chance to speak. “I’m innocent!” he called out before being taken away.

While social and economic reforms have generally led to greater personal freedom for many Chinese citizens, the government’s intolerance of political dissent has hardened. Dissidents are routinely arrested or detained and the lawyers who defend them are harassed.

“It’s interesting to observe the government’s attempt to bury all the embarrassing news just before Chinese New Year,” which starts Saturday, said Nicholas Bequelin, an Asia researcher for New York-based Human Rights Watch. “Even the government doesn’t seem confident in the legitimacy of these cases.”

The United States and the European Union responded swiftly to Liu’s failed appeal with statements condemning China’s treatment of the academic, who has been found guilty of inciting to subvert state power. China routinely uses the vaguely worded charge to jail people it considers troublemakers.

“Persecution of individuals for the peaceful expression of political views is inconsistent with internationally recognized norms of human rights,” U.S. Ambassador Jon Huntsman said in an e-mailed statement. It was the first statement issued under his name since taking his post in August.

“We believe that he should not have been sentenced in the first place and should be released immediately,” Hunstman said. Simon Sharpe, a spokesman for the European Union delegation in China, also called for Liu’s immediate release.

A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman said Liu’s case was handled according to law and brushed off Huntsman’s call for Liu’s release.

“There are no dissidents in China,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Ma Zhaoxu added in response to a reporter who asked whether China’s treatment of dissidents might negatively affect its image overseas.

It was bad week for activists: On Tuesday, the Chengdu Intermediate Court in Sichuan province sentenced writer and activist Tan Zuoren to five years on the same charge as Liu after he investigated the deaths of thousands of children in a massive earthquake in 2008. The court said he was being punished for commemorating the Tiananmen Square movement and criticizing the government’s crackdown on it.

The same court on Monday upheld a three-year prison sentence for another earthquake activist, Huang Qi. Huang was convicted of illegally possessing state secrets, another ill-defined charge often used by communist leaders to clamp down on dissent and imprison activists.

A former university professor, Liu is among China’s most prominent political activists. He spent 20 months in jail for joining the 1989 student-led protests in Tiananmen Square, which ended when the government called in the military — killing hundreds, perhaps thousands of demonstrators.

At the end of 2008, he co-authored a document calling for stronger civil rights and an end to Communist Party political dominance. Some 10,000 people have signed it in the past year, though a news blackout and Internet censorship have left most Chinese unaware that it exists.

The official Xinhua News Agency, a government mouthpiece, said in a report on Liu’s case Thursday that the 56-year-old writer was convicted because he had gone beyond the limits of free speech allowed by China’s constitution.

It quoted a Chinese legal expert as saying Liu “had spread anti-government rumors and slanders, and had organized and persuaded other people to join activities aimed at overturning the current government.”

“His conduct was dangerous to the country,” Xinhua quoted Gao Mingxuan, president of the International Association of Penal Law China Branch, as saying.

Liu’s 11-year prison sentence is the harshest penalty given for inciting subversion since the crime was introduced in 1997, said a San Francisco-based human rights group, the Dui Hua Foundation.

“I’d say he was quite emotional,” his lawyer, Shang Baojun, told reporters after the hearing. Shang said Liu’s legal options have been exhausted.

Liu’s wife was given 20 minutes with her husband and allowed to hug him after the court proceedings.

“So thin!” Liu Xia said of her husband. “I just wanted to be able to hold him. It might be 11 years before I can hold him again.”