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Advocacy Alert: Chinese
Labor Activists Convicted of Subversion (5/12/03) Advocacy Alert: Chinese Labor Activists Charged with Subversion (1/13/03) LCHR Statement to Congressional-Executive Commission on China (3/4/02) LCHR Letter to Chinese Officials Re. Imprisonment of Workers Rights Activist (8/29/01) 
Human Rights Defenders Project |
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Human Rights Defenders in China The human rights situation in China continues to be grave. China has secured a prominent position in the international arena, symbolized by its admission to the WTO, its successful bid to host the 2008 Olympics and the 2002 visit of President Bush. However, this has not been accompanied by a parallel improvement in human rights. Instead, government statements about upholding “the rule of law” have frequently veiled harsh political repression. This is most poignantly illustrated by the “Strike Hard” campaign, which resulted in scores of executions after procedural and substantive abuses of criminal law. Moreover, in the aftermath of the September 11, 2024 tragedy in New York, anti-terrorist rhetoric has been misused to legitimize harsh crack-downs in Tibet and Xinjiang province, and illegitimate censorship of all forms of media, including the internet. An abundance of NGO-reports, as well as the annual evaluations of China’s human rights practices by the State Department’s Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor, narrate these and other violations of the most fundamental human rights. They describe crackdowns on dissidents, cases of arbitrary arrest and detention of suspects, torture, forced prison labor, and abusive labor conditions. Freedom of expression continues to be restricted, and voices that endeavor to draw attention to pressing issues of national and global concern are frequently violently silenced. The Lawyers Committee has welcomed positive developments in the Chinese legal system over the past few decades. However, continuing violations illustrate that a strong legislative framework cannot by itself secure the rule of law. It is necessary to enforce this legal framework in practice. To that end, China needs to build a strong, independent legal profession, and to permit independent local human rights activists to organize and function freely.
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