Human rights fears grow as Gao Yu, 70, faces life sentence, while jailed Uighur scholar’s appeal is turned down
Chinese journalist Gao Yu in 2012. State media have said she is accused of leaking an internal Communist party document to foreigners. Photograph: Kin Cheung/AP
Friday 21 November 2014 09.30 EST
China has tried a veteran journalist for revealing state secrets and dismissed a prominent Uighur scholar’s appeal against a life sentence in cases that human rights groups say are evidence that tolerance of dissent has been considerably lowered.
The closed-door hearings came shortly after it emerged that a celebrated rights lawyer who represented the artist Ai Weiwei is accused of up to four offences thought to include the rarely brought charge of inciting racial hatred. The journalist Gao Yu, 70, is charged with giving state secrets to foreign contacts and faces a life sentence if found guilty, as is all but guaranteed in such cases. State media have said she is accused of leaking an internal Communist party document to foreigners.
The charge is thought to relate to Document Number 9, which attacked western democratic ideals and called for tighter ideological controls, but it is impossible to be certain because the evidence is classified as a state secret.
Gao maintained her innocence at a four-hour trial, her lawyer Mo Shaoping said. State television aired images of her making a confession shortly after her detention in May, but Mo has previously said Gao confessed because authorities had threatened her son with arrest.
Earlier, Ilham Tohti, China’s best-known advocate for the rights of Muslim Uighurs, learned that his appeal against a life sentence for separatism had been dismissed. The harsh sentence has been condemned by the US and EU.
The 45-year-old economics professor was jailed in September after a 10-month detention and all his assets were confiscated. He was well-known for criticising government policies in Xinjiang but had said he did not support independence for the region.
Li Fangping, one of his representatives, told Reuters that Tohti would appeal against the ruling. The hearing took place in the Urumqi detention centre where he is being held, which his lawyers said violated normal procedure and they were unable to attend because of the short notice given. He said Tohti had been kept in leg irons for almost two months.
Nicholas Bequelin, senior China researcher for Human Rights Watch, said: “It is pretty clear the tolerance for dissent has been considerably lowered. All these people who have been active for years and under restrictions or surveillance, but nonetheless free, suddenly find themselves on the wrong side of the line.”
