China accused of the political murder of Tiananmen dissident Liu
Political prisoner and Nobel Peace laureate, 61, dies of liver cancer in heavily-guarded hospital
BEIJING was accused of bearing a “heavy responsibility” for the “premature” death of Liu Xiaobo, a Nobel Peace laureate and China’s most wellknown political prisoner.
Liu died in a heavily guarded hospital yesterday after a battle with liver cancer. The death of the 61-year-old dissident and veteran of the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989 sent shock waves through China’s activist community and human rights campaigners across the world.
Boris Johnson, the Foreign Secretary, said he was “deeply sad” at Mr Liu’s death. “Liu Xiaobo should have been allowed to choose his own medical treatment overseas, which the Chinese authorities repeatedly denied him,” he said. “This was wrong and I now urge them to lift all restrictions on his widow, Liu Xia.”
Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, said Liu was a “courageous fighter”, while the leader of the Norwegian Nobel Committee accused Beijing of having a “heavy responsibility for his premature death”.
“We find it deeply disturbing that Liu Xiaobo was not transferred to a facility where he could receive adequate medical treatment before he became terminally ill,” said Berit Reiss-andersen in an statement.
Rex Tillerson, the United States’ secretary of state, expressed condolences over the death of Liu and called on Beijing to release his wife, Liu Xia, and allow her to leave China.
Liu, who was jailed in 2009 for state subversion, was transferred from prison to hospital in the north-eastern city of Shenyang last month. Despite increasingly desperate calls from supporters for him to be granted his dying wish to receive treatment for his condition abroad, Liu remained in China, where he died yesterday evening, local officials said.
His friends claim China’s refusal to allow him to travel overseas was a deliberate attempt to shorten his life, to ensure he could not criticise Beijing in his final moments.
“I think it is a political murder,” Hu Jia, an activist and friend of Liu told The Daily Telegraph. “I am in so much pain, but I have no more tears to shed as I have already cried too much over the past few days. I was expecting him to be taken away from his hospital bed, but no miracle happened.”
Liu was handed an 11-year prison term for calling for sweeping political reforms in a manifesto entitled Charter 08. He became only the third person to receive a Nobel Peace award while imprisoned by his own government, and the first to die in custody since tuberculosis killed Carl von Ossietzky, 48, a German pacifist, in 1938.
Liu had spent time in prison in China before 2009, and was already the country’s most famous government critic when he was sentenced for his part in Charter 08. But he became a global figure when he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2010 at a ceremony where he was represented by an empty chair. The award was made in recognition of Liu’s “long and non-violent struggle for fundamental human rights in China”. Beijing had repeatedly dismissed foreign criticism of its treatment of Mr Liu, saying that it was an internal affair. So- phie Richardson, China director at Human Rights Watch, said: “The Chinese government’s arrogance, cruelty, and callousness are shocking – but Liu’s struggle for a rights-respecting, democratic China will live on.”
Liu was born to an intellectual family in Jilin province in China’s northeast. The former professor of literature at Beijing Normal University wrote about the value of individual freedoms and non-violent resistance. He was influential at the Tiananmen Square protests, which ended when tanks rolled into central Beijing, killing hundreds, possibly over a thousand, protesters.
Liu’s family was by his side when he died, his doctors said. Liu was “primarily saying goodbye to his wife” and telling her to “live well” in his last moments, doctor Teng Yue’e told a news conference yesterday. Chinese
police have kept Mr Liu’s wife, Liu Xia, under house arrest for several years and activists in China are now concerned for her fate. Calls for her to be given her freedom were also made by Jean-yves Le Drian, the French foreign
‘I was expecting him to be taken away from his hospital bed, but no miracle happened’
‘I do not know what Liu Xia will do next, but … she wants to leave for another country’
minister. Mo Shaoping, Liu’s lawyer, said: “I do not know what Liu Xia will do next, but based on my understanding, she wants to leave for another country where she can live the rest of her life.”