The 2011 crackdown on dissidents in China refers to the arrest of dozens of mainland Chinese rights lawyers, activists and grassroots agitators in a response to the 2011 Chinese pro-democracy protests. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] Since the protests, at least 54 Chinese activists have been arrested or detained by authorities in the biggest crackdown on dissent since the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre. [6] [7] Since the start of the protests in mid-February 2011, human rights groups have claimed that more than 54 people have been arrested by authorities, some of whom have been charged with crimes. Among those arrested are bloggers who criticise the government such as Ai Weiwei, lawyers who pursue cases against the government, and human rights activists.
At least 54 leading activists have been arrested or detained by authorities including: [7]
Renee Xia, the international director of Chinese Human Rights Defenders, commented on 26 February 2011: "The numbers point to a bad situation that is only getting worse. In the matter of a few days, we have seen more cases of prominent lawyers subjected to prolonged disappearances, more criminal charges that may carry lengthy prison sentences for activists, more home raids, and a heavier reliance on extralegal measures."; [2] In addition, according to Phelim Kine of Human Rights Watch, three people, Lan Ruoyu, Tan Yanhua, and Zhang Haibo, are believed to be still missing by September 2011. A total of about 17 people from the above list remain in detention, prison, or re-education through labor. An unknown number of people remain held in house detention.[ citation needed ]
Huang Qi is a Chinese webmaster and human rights activist from Sichuan. He is the co-founder of Tianwang Center for Missing Persons, along with his wife Zeng Li. Initially the mission of the organization was to help counter human trafficking that had become a swelling problem in the late 1990s, but later it was expanded to include campaign against human rights abuse. Huang is also the owner and webmaster of 64tianwang.com, a website originally intended to release news about people who had disappeared in the People's Republic of China.
Xia Lin, is a Chinese lawyer known for taking on human rights cases. Among his more prominent clients was the artist and activist Ai Weiwei. In late 2016 he was sentenced to 12 years in prison for fraud.
Hu Jia is a Chinese civil rights activist and noted critic of the Chinese Communist Party. His work has focused on the Chinese democracy movement, Chinese environmentalist movement, and HIV/AIDS in the People's Republic of China. Hu is the director of June Fourth Heritage & Culture Association, and he has been involved with AIDS advocacy as the executive director of the Beijing Aizhixing Institute of Health Education and as one of the founders of the non-governmental organization Loving Source. He has also been involved in work to protect the endangered Tibetan antelope. For his activism, Hu has received awards from several European bodies, such as the Paris City Council and the European Parliament, which awarded the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought to him in December 2008.
Ai Weiwei is a Chinese contemporary artist, documentarian, and activist. Ai grew up in the far northwest of China, where he lived under harsh conditions due to his father's exile. As an activist, he has been openly critical of the Chinese Government's stance on democracy and human rights. He investigated government corruption and cover-ups, in particular the Sichuan schools corruption scandal following the collapse of "tofu-dreg schools" in the 2008 Sichuan earthquake. In April 2011, Ai Weiwei was arrested at Beijing Capital International Airport for "economic crimes," and detained for 81 days without charge. Ai Weiwei emerged as a vital instigator in Chinese cultural development, an architect of Chinese modernism, and one of the nation's most vocal political commentators.
Pu Zhiqiang is a Chinese civil rights lawyer who specialises in press freedom, defamation, and product safety, and other issues. Based in Beijing, he is an executive partner of the Huayi Law Firm. Pu is known for being a prominent member of the Weiquan movement, having advocated for writers and journalists in a number of high-profile cases. Due to the nature of the cases he has taken on and his criticism of official Chinese policies, Pu's actions are monitored by the Chinese state security services, and he has been detained and questioned on several occasions.
Xu Zhiyong is a Chinese civil rights activist and formerly a lecturer at the Beijing University of Post and Telecommunications. He was one of the founders of the NGO Open Constitution Initiative and an active rights lawyer in China who campaigned against corruption and helped those underprivileged. He is the main founder and icon of the New Citizens' Movement in China. In January 2014 he was sentenced to four years in prison for "gathering crowds to disrupt public order". He was detained again on February 15, 2020, in the southern city of Guangzhou after two months in hiding, for his participation in a meeting of rights activists and lawyers in Xiamen in December 2019 in which "democratic transition in China" was discussed. He was sentenced for subversion to 14 years in jail on April 10, 2023.
Teng Biao is a Chinese lawyer and political activist. He is a lecturer at the China University of Political Science and Law in Beijing. He has been a vocal supporter of human rights activists such as Chen Guangcheng and Hu Jia. He has been arrested at least twice, in March 2008 and in February 2011. He was also a visiting scholar at Harvard Law School from (2015-16) and at the Chinese University of Hong Kong.
Charter 08 is a manifesto initially signed by 303 Chinese dissident intellectuals and human rights activists. It was published on 10 December 2008, the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopting its name and style from the anti-Soviet Charter 77 issued by dissidents in Czechoslovakia. Since its release, more than 10,000 people inside and outside China have signed the charter. After unsuccessful reform efforts in 1989 and 1998 by the Chinese democracy movement, Charter 08 was the first challenge to one-party rule that declared the end of one-party rule to be its goal; it has been described as the first one with a unified strategy.
The Weiquan movement is a non-centralized group of lawyers, legal experts, and intellectuals in China who seek to protect and defend the civil rights of the citizenry through litigation and legal activism. The movement, which began in the early 2000s, has organized demonstrations, sought reform via the legal system and media, defended victims of human rights abuses, and written appeal letters, despite opposition from the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Among the issues adopted by Weiquan lawyers are property and housing rights, protection for AIDS victims, environmental damage, religious freedom, freedom of speech and the press, and defending the rights of other lawyers facing disbarment or imprisonment.
Liu Xianbin, from Suining, Sichuan province, People's Republic of China, is a human rights activist, China Democracy Party organizer, writer and signer of Charter 08.
The 2011 Chinese pro-democracy protests, also known as the Greater Chinese Democratic Jasmine Revolution, refer to public assemblies in over a dozen cities in China starting on 20 February 2011, inspired by and named after the Jasmine Revolution in Tunisia; the actions that took place at protest sites, and the response by the Chinese government to the calls and action.
Ran Yunfei is a Chinese writer and a high-profile democracy activist and blogger. He was arrested in late March 2011, shortly after the start of the 2011 Chinese pro-democracy protests, on charges of "inciting subversion of state power". He was released in August 2011 and remains under residential surveillance. Ran expressed through social media that he converted to Christianity on 31 October 2015. He was baptized by Pastor Wang Yi at Early Rain Covenant Church, and has been attending a Bible study since 2013.
Chen Wei is a Chinese dissident and human rights activist. In December 2011, he was sentenced to nine years in prison for inciting subversion.
Ding Mao, born in Mianyang, Sichuan on 9 November 1968, is a Chinese dissident. As a student, he was one of the leaders of the student democracy movement, known through the Tiananmen Square 1989 protest. He became general manager of an investment company, and one of the founders of the unrecognized Social Democratic Party. Mao was recently detained on 19 February 2011, and held at Mianyang Municipal Detention Center before being released into residential surveillance on 2 December 2011.
Zhu Yufu, born 13 February 1953 in Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China, is a political dissident. In 1998, he was one of the founders of the unrecognized Democracy Party of China (DPC). He also founded the "Opposition Party" magazine, carrying articles about the DPC. He was jailed for publishing a poem that directed people to participate in the 2011 Chinese pro-democracy protests.
Jiang Tianyong is a human rights lawyer in the People's Republic of China. Based in Beijing, he is a prominent figure in the Weiquan movement, and has defended Tibetans, petitioners, Falun Gong adherents, HIV/AIDS victims, and other vulnerable groups. Jiang's human rights advocacy has drawn the ire of Chinese authorities; his applications for renewal of his legal license have been denied, and he has been detained on multiple occasions.
Wu Gan is a Chinese blogger and human rights activist from Fuqing, Fujian who uses the internet name "Super Vulgar Butcher" or "Butcher Wu Gan", and is known for his provocative signs and banners in support of his protests. He was sentenced to eight years in prison in December 2017 for subversion of state power, and was last incarcerated in Qingliu Prison in Fujian until his release in May 2023.
Wang Quanzhang is a Chinese human rights lawyer from Wulian County, Shandong. Wang is known for defending clients in politically sensitive cases against the Chinese government, which led to his arrest in the 709 crackdown. He was then sentenced to four and a half years in prison for subverting state power. After Wang's release in 2020, Wang has been monitored, his landlords have been pressured to evict his family, and his son has been barred from attending school.
The 709 Crackdown was a nationwide crackdown on Chinese lawyers and human rights activists instigated during the summer of 2015. It is known as the "709 crackdown" as it started on 9 July 2015.