2015-04-02
Updated at 04:35 P.M. EST on 2015-04-02
Authorities in the southern Chinese province of Guangdong have formally arrested three netizens on suspicion of “incitement to subvert state power” after they posted satirical and pro-democracy tweets to social media, their lawyer said on Thursday.
Liang Qinhui, also known by his online nickname “Sharp Knife,” was detained by police in Guangdong’s provincial capital Guangzhou.
Police also detained Zheng Jingxian, known by his online nickname “Right Road for China” and Huang Qian, known by her online nickname “Jailbreak Archive,” Liang’s lawyer Wu Kuiming told RFA.
“The police detained them in separate operations, but they were all detained because of tweets they posted,” Wu said.
“One was Liang … another was ‘Right Road for China,’ and there was another, ‘Jailbreak Archive,’” he said.
“I heard they were all arrested on the same charge,” Wu said. “I think [they posted] stuff about democracy and political awakening and suchlike.”
Liang’s fiancee Fu Yuqin said the formal arrest notification had come 37 days after his initial detention.
“He was moved to the Guangzhou No. 1 Detention Center on March 10, and he has been held for a total of 58 days now,” Fu said.
She added: “I sent him some things in the second half of last month, some money, but I haven’t seen him since [his detention].”
Fu said police had questioned her about Liang’s activities shortly before that.
“They came and questioned me about what tools he used to get online,” she said. “They also asked me who he normally had contact with.”
“I told them he was an honest and law-abiding person with very few possessions in his place; all he had was his smartphone,” Fu said.
Fu told RFA at the time of Liang’s initial detention that police had accused him of insulting Chinese President Xi Jinping in his posts to the popular chat site QQ.
However, it was hard to gauge from copies of his posts seen by RFA what exactly had triggered Liang’s arrest.
“I told them that he had tweeted about air pollution and things like that, and then suddenly they have pinned this heavy charge on him,” Fu said on Thursday. “I am totally dumbfounded by this.”
“The police told me we exist in this environment, and so we must depend on the [ruling Chinese Communist] Party, and that there are some things that we shouldn’t say,” she said.
Fu said she is still unsure if or when the case will go to trial.
“I haven’t had any news, and there’s no timetable, and I don’t know if he will be sentenced to prison, or what’s happening,” she said.
In February, Fu had quoted one of Liang’s posts as saying that the beauty of a society lies in equality, and that of a country in freedom, the beauty of a government in its people, and the beauty of the people’s lives lies in their enjoyment of their rights.
Behind the Great Firewall
China’s 649 million Internet users are increasingly chafing against the complex system of blocks, filters and human censorship known collectively as the “Great Firewall,” or GFW.
