International advocacy groups are calling for an independent investigation into the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP’s) clampdown on independent legal advocacy that the regime unleashed a decade ago.
More than 300 rights lawyers and legal activists were arrested across China in the expansive campaign, which began on July 9, 2015. Some were forced to disappear for months. At least 10 received prison terms ranging from three to eight years, according to a joint statement released by 31 prominent international human rights organisations on July 7.
As a result, the number of lawyers willing to challenge Beijing over its human rights abuses was significantly reduced, according to the statement.
Sarah Brook, China director at Amnesty International, said Beijing’s attack on the legal professionals “helped facilitate a broader and more sustained attack on human rights.”
Although most of the advocates have since been released, some continue to endure relentless surveillance and harassment, forcing them to move out of their homes or even quit their professions.
Among them is Wang Quanzhang, one of China’s the most prominent rights advocates who was arrested in mid-2015 and later charged with subversion for taking up cases sensitive to Beijing, such as representing practitioners of Falun Gong, a meditative practice that has been brutally persecuted by the CCP since 1999.
After nearly five years behind bars, Wang reunited with his family in April 2020. However, the authorities’ harassment appears to have never stopped. In 2023, Wang revealed that his family had been evicted from 13 homes in just two months. In some cases, the authorities’ pressure on landlords led to the electricity and gas being cut off, leaving his family with no choice but to move out.
Wang was also subject to tight surveillance. In a photo posted on his X account in June, he showed six plain-clothed men stationed outside his apartment in order to monitor him.
The repression has extended to Wang’s family. During the three years he was forced to disappear, before his trial in 2018, his son was denied admission to several schools due to the CCP’s pressure, according to a 2023 report by Safeguard Defenders. Now, after being kicked out of school once again, his 12-year-old son is left studying alone at home.
As the 10th anniversary of the incident—often referred to as the “709 crackdown”—approaches, the coalition of human rights groups urged concerned governments to take “urgent action.”
“No Chinese authorities have been held accountable for grave rights abuses against lawyers and human rights defenders, emboldening the government to commit increasingly widespread and systematic human rights violations,” read the statement..
Despite the ongoing repression, some of these legal activists continue to speak out.
That includes Xie Yang, whose plight captured global attention in January 2017, when his lawyer publicized the transcripts of their meetings, shedding light on the days and nights of abuses Xie suffered in custody.
Xie was released on bail in May 2017, shortly after he retracted torture accusations and confessed to charges including subversion, a move he later described as a deal with the authorities in exchange for the safety of his family members.
In an interview with The Epoch Times in 2019, Xie stated that he still couldn’t share the details of that deal but he mentioned that the authorities had threatened to cut off the income of his brother, his wife, and to jeopardize the safety of his two daughters to pressure him into making a confession.
“They even warned, ‘Your wife and children better watch out when driving. Traffic incidents could happen at any time,’” Xie recounted the interrogator’s words.
Despite being disbarred and living under tight police surveillance for years, Xie maintained optimism, continuing to do similar work that doesn’t require a license.
“Having such an experience and managing to survive it filled me with pride,” Xie said while laughing during an interview published in the Chinese edition of The Epoch Times in July 2020. “I will tell this experience to my children to make them proud.”
In 2022, after voicing support for a pregnant teacher, who was committed to a psychiatric hospital by local authorities for questioning the CCP on social media, Xie was arrested again.
He has been detained for more than 1,000 days without a trial, facing accusations of “inciting subversion of state power,” a charge that often applies to critics of the CCP.
Xie’s wife, Chen Guiqiu, said he was deprived of sunlight and communication and was tortured by detention guards.
“Despite all kinds of abuses, Xie Yang doesn’t submit,” Chen, who fled to the United States with their daughters in 2017, told The Epoch Times recently.
Maya Wang, associate China director at Human Rights Watch, said these right lawyers and their families have suffered tremendously for seeking to provide justice to people in China.
“Foreign governments should counter their ongoing persecution and silencing by providing international recognition, solidarity, and support to these courageous lawyers,” Wang said in a separate statement on July 6.
The group expects the immediate future of China’s rights defense lawyers to be grim but it cited an unnamed Chinese lawyer who said that there are still many lawyers willing to defend the rights of persecuted spiritual and religious groups, although they have toned down their approach.
“I think there are some lawyers who are forced to turn to a semi-underground approach, such as lawyers who defend Falun Gong and [underground] Christians. But no matter what, they still appear in court,” the lawyer was quoted as saying in the statement.