2014-11-06
A file photo of inmates at a women’s labor camp in Zhengzhou, Henan province.
EyePress News
As the United Nations reviews China’s record in preventing violence against women, the authorities continue to detain and harass outspoken women activists, according to petitioners and rights activists Thursday.
Authorities in the central city of Wuhan handed a 10-day administrative sentence to activist Ye Haiyan after she posted a naked photo of herself online in a bid to highlight the U.N. review, the overseas-based Chinese Human Rights Defenders (CHRD) group reported.
Ye Haiyan, who founded the Women’s Rights Workshop, was taken away by police in her home district of Xinzhou after her home was searched last Friday, but the initial reason for her detention was unclear, lawyers told RFA at the time.
Ye was given a 10-day administrative detention, which can be handed down by a police committee without trial, for “intentionally exposing her body in a public place,” CHRD said in a statement e-mailed to RFA.
“Ye’s detention is due to a naked photo of herself she posted online on Oct. 22 that was meant to draw greater attention to the UN review,” said the group, which collates and translates reports from a number of Chinese rights groups.
She is currently being held at the Wuhan No. 1 Detention Center in Hubei province, it said.
Passport confiscated
In neighboring Henan province, authorities have confiscated the passport of HIV/AIDS activist Wang Qiuyun to prevent her from traveling to Geneva to contribute to the review.
Wang had planned to receive human rights training and meet members of the Committee for the Elimination of Violence Against Women (CEDAW), CHRD said.
She had already received visa from the Swiss authorities, but Chinese authorities intercepted her passport on “orders from higher up,” it said.
Wang’s case echoes that of late rights activist Cao Shunli, who was similarly prevented from traveling to Geneva for China’s human rights review, and later died in police custody after her lawyers said she was denied adequate medical care.
Petitioners detained
Meanwhile, authorities in Beijing have continued to detain and harass petitioners, the majority of whom are women and have been identified by rights groups as among the most vulnerable to illegal detention, violence and sexual abuse in unofficial detention centers, or “black jails.”
