China cracks down

On Feb. 25, a Chinese human rights lawyer, Li Baiguang, checked into a military hospital in Nanjing, China, complaining of stomach pains. Within hours, he was dead, reportedly of liver failure, even though he had no known medical problems. His death at age 49 can be described only as suspicious and comes at a time when China continues to tighten the screws against human rights work and democracy.

Li was among those who signed Charter 08, the daring manifesto unveiled in December 2008 calling for democracy and human rights in China, pioneered in part by Liu Xiaobo, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate who later died after spending years in a Chinese prison.

Li was also repeatedly detained and imprisoned; his lawyer’s license was withheld; and he was sometimes treated violently. According to ChinaAid, he recently received anonymous death threats after being kidnapped in Zhejiang province and beaten up for his work representing victims of an illegal governmental land grab.

For more than two years, Chinese authorities have been trying to dismantle the network of lawyers who help defend victims of human rights abuses, arresting them arbitrarily and closing down law firms.

The party’s grip has recently grown still stronger. A reorganization being undertaken after the removal of term limits on President Xi Jinping has put the party more directly in control of such important areas as the news media, books, film, the economy, foreign affairs, religion and other matters. Government departments that had overseen many of these areas are being absorbed into the party apparatus, giving the reins directly to the Communist Party officials.

By his labors, often challenging the powerful, Li showed that lawyers in China could make a difference against a powerful and entrenched system. That ideal must not be abandoned.