2015-01-29
The Occupy Central movement enters its 68th day in Hong Kong, Dec. 4, 2014.
RFA
Authorities in the southern Chinese province of Guangdong have formally arrested an online activist for subversion after he publicly supported Hong Kong’s Occupy Central pro-democracy movement, his wife and lawyer said.
Huizhou-based Ye Xiaozheng, known online by his nickname Humian Yizhou (“A boat on the lake”), is being held on suspicion of “incitement to subvert state power,” his wife Zhong Shuimei told RFA on Thursday.
“I went to visit him [in the detention center on Wednesday],” Zhong said. “It lasted 20 minutes.”
“He said the food was terrible and that the rice was often not cooked properly, so he always had to buy food separately,” she said.
“His mood was pretty normal; we didn’t talk for very long, because we weren’t allowed to discuss anything to do with his case,” Zhong said.
Zhong said she is very worried that Ye will receive a prison sentence.
“I am afraid they will charge him and send him to prison, and there are also the lawyer’s fees to pay,” she said. “I won’t be able to afford them.”
Ye’s lawyer, Sui Muqing, said he had also visited his client on Monday.
“He has been moved to a different cell, and he told me that the detention center guards won’t let him talk to anyone else in the cell,” Sui said.
“The other people are saying he’s a traitor to China.”
“Incitement to subvert state power,” a charge listed in Article 105 of China’s Criminal Law, carries a maximum jail term of five years, but this can be extended for those regarded as “ringleaders” or in serious cases.
‘Psychologically prepared’
Sui said Ye, a vocal activist who has posted online in support of democratic reforms, constitutional government and official corruption, was “psychologically prepared” to do time in jail.
“He just never thought he would do it on account of Occupy Central,” he said.
Ye was initially detained on Dec. 18 by Huizhou police, and is being held at the police-run Huizhou Detention Center, where he told Sui he was shackled for long periods and subjected to “harsh interrogation,” the Chinese Human Rights Defenders (CHRD) group said in a recent report.
Last year, Ye posted a photo of himself online during Hong Kong’s Umbrella Movement holding a banner saying “Protesting for Freedom,” and a T-shirt with the slogan: “When the people fear the government, then there is tyranny.”
According to CHRD, which compiles and translates reports from rights groups inside China, 113 mainland activists had been detained for supporting the Occupy Central campaign by Jan. 27, while 74 have since been released.
“Many mainlanders have expressed their support by traveling to Hong Kong to join the protests, or meeting in small gatherings and posting messages on social media, including photos of themselves’ holding signs in support of the protests,” CHRD said in an online report on the detentions.
