Beijing: The trial of detained human rights lawyer Wang Quanzhang began in the Chinese city of Tianjin early on Wednesday, over three years after he was detained in a large-scale crackdown on rights activists in the country.
Wang has been charged with attempting to subvert state power,according to the Tianjin Second Intermediate People’s Court, where the closed trial is being held. He faces a maximum sentence of life imprisonment.
“From past cases we can see that activists get very harsh sentences if they refuse to confess in exchange for leniency,” Amnesty International China researcher Doriane Lau said.
The timing of Wang’s trial so close to a major Western holiday follows that of Nobel Prize winner Liu Xiaobo and human rights activist Wu Gan, who were both sentenced on Christmas Day in 2009 and2017.
Wang worked for the now-shuttered law firm Fengrui in Beijing, which was well known in China for taking on difficult cases and represented members of the Falun Gong and acclaimed dissident artist Ai Weiwei.
Fengrui’s founder, Zhou Shifeng, is in the process of serving a seven-year sentence for subverting state power.
Both men were arrested as part of China’s “709” that crackdown on human rights lawyers and activists, which began in July 2015, when over 200 people were detained. Many who have since been released reported being “beaten, made to stand for up to 15 consecutive hours and force-fed medication”following their release, according to Amnesty International.
Lau said on Wednesday that there were “serious” concerns that Wang was being treated poorly in prison.
While other lawyers arrested in the crackdown have since stood trial or were ultimately released on bail, Wang is unique in serving over three years in detention without outside contact.
He was only permitted to see a lawyer this July and has not been able to see his wife, Li Wenzu, since he was detained in August 2015.
Li has continued to campaign on behalf of her husband and other detained lawyers. She wrote on Facebook on Wednesday that she was barred from attending the trial.
Last week, she publicly shaved her head as an act of protest against her husband’s detention. In April, she attempted to walk 100 kilometres from Beijing to Tianjin, where she thought Wang was being held, although she was stopped halfway by police.
Photos of the trial released on social media showed a significant presence of plainclothes security, while foreign media reported on Twitter that protesters objecting to Wang’s trial were detained. — dpa
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