Police cordoned off the Tianjin No. 2 Intermediate People’s Court on Tuesday, one day after protesters flanked by foreign diplomats demanded more information about the cases.
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Patrick Poon, a researcher at Amnesty International, said that Hu may have gotten a heavy sentence “because the Chinese government wants to set an example to the other activists what consequences they would face for their human rights work”.
A police vehicle passes by the Tianjin No. 2 Intermediate People’s Court in northern China’s Tianjin Municipality on Tuesday, Aug. 2, 2016.
BEIJING (AP) – A Chinese lawyer was sentenced to seven years in prison Thursday in the third of a series of subversion trials demonstrating the ruling Communist Party’s determination to shut down independent human rights activists and government critics.
He has also been deprived of his political rights for five years, according to Tianjin No. 2 Intermediate People’s Court, Xinhua news agency reported.
He pleaded guilty and said he will not appeal.
Fellow activist Zhai Yanmin was sentenced to 3 years of imprisonment with a four year suspension on Tuesday. Both were arrested in July a year ago as part of a nationwide government campaign.
It was at the centre of the “709 crackdown” – named for the July 2015 date on which it began – which saw more than 200 activists and lawyers detained for involvement in cases considered sensitive by China’s ruling Communist party.
“Hu’s ideology and his behaviors have seriously harmed the country and social stability”, state media quoted prosecutors as saying.
Hu previously served 14 years of a 20-year sentence from 1994 to 2008 for organizing and leading counter-revolutionary cliques and engaging in counter-revolutionary propaganda and instigations. His previous conviction likely contributed to the long sentence imposed this week.
A graduate of prestigious Peking University, Hu was a professor in the capital when he became active with a would-be political opposition party following the army’s violent crackdown on 1989 pro-democracy protests centered on Beijing’s Tiananmen Square.
More than a dozen other lawyers and activists remain in detention, their legal status uncertain.
This week’s trials are part of a pattern established under the administration of President Xi Jinping to use more sophisticated legal means to attack perceived opponents as it maintains pressure on activists and non-governmental organizations. Chinese authorities barred foreign media from entering the courtroom.
“Hu Shigen always talked about sensitive cases and the ways to hype them up”, said a witness surnamed Liu in court. She told Hong Kong’s Oriental Daily News and other outlets that she regretted her past actions, but many think she was forced into making the statement since her family members are still detained by the authorities.
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