Beijing’s Nobel Shame

Dying dissident Liu Xiaobo must be allowed to travel, UK and EU urge China
By Tom Phillips in Beijing

Britain and the European Union have joined a growing chorus of voices calling for China to completely free its most famous political prisoner, the dying Nobel laureate Liu Xiaobo.
A spokesperson for the British embassy in Beijing said Britain had “repeatedly expressed serious concern at the treatment of Liu Xiaobo by the Chinese authorities”.
“We continue to urge the Chinese authorities to ensure Liu Xiaobo has access to his choice of medical treatment, in a location of his choice, and to lift all restrictions on him and his wife Liu Xia,” the spokesperson added.
A spokesperson for the EU delegation in Beijing said it had discussed the activist’s case with the authorities and asked “that China immediately grant Mr Liu parole on humanitarian grounds and allow him to receive medical assistance at a place of his choosing in China or overseas.”
In an earlier statement the EU had said it also expected China “to remove all limitations on the movements of Mr Liu’s wife and family members”.
A spokesperson for the Chinese foreign ministry, Geng Shuang, rejected the appeals. 

The calls came one day after two foreign doctors who were allowed to visit the dissident in hospital announced they believed he was well enough to be moved overseas, despite Chinese claims to the contrary.
In the light of that announcement, Jared Genser, a US lawyer who represents Liu and is lobbying for his evacuation, called on Xi Jinping to immediately free his client. 

He said Liu had expressed a desire to receive treatment in Germany or the United States, with hospitals in both countries ready and willing to take him in.
“Xi Jinping should honour a dying man’s wishes to be able to leave China and to obtain better treatment that is available abroad,” and could extend Liu’s life by several weeks, Genser said.
“My view is that not only should this happen, but that this must happen and I also believe that there will be enormous pressure placed on Xi from the international community to relent,” he added.
The Chinese artist Ai Weiwei is also among those calling Liu’s release. 

“This is a historic mistake ... this is going to be remembered the whole world,” he said.

In a statement, the executive director of Pen America, Suzanne Nossel, said “the Chinese government’s morality and humanity” would be tested by its decision to allow Liu to leave China or not. 

“There can be no more powerful indicator of Beijing’s respect for human dignity than their treatment of Liu Xiaobo in this time of need.”
Liu, a veteran democracy activist and writer who became a lifelong campaigner after witnessing the 1989 Tiananmen crackdown, was diagnosed with late-stage liver cancer in May while serving an 11-year prison sentence for subversion. 

He is being held, reportedly under police guard, in a hospital in north-east China where authorities insist he is receiving “meticulous treatment”.
Liu was detained in late 2008 for his involvement in a pro-democracy manifesto called Charter 08 and was found guilty of incitement to subvert state power – effectively working to topple China’s one-party state – on Christmas Day the following year.
In 2010 he received the Nobel peace prize for his “unflinching and peaceful advocacy for reform”. 

Unable to attend the award ceremony in Oslo because he was in jail, Liu was represented by an empty chair.

Beijing’s Nobel Shame

Western doctors contradict China on Nobel laureate's cancer
BBC News

Supporters have appealed to China to allow Mr Liu to travel abroad for treatment

Two Western doctors have contradicted Chinese medical experts over the fate of a dying Nobel Peace Prize winner.
Liu Xiaobo, an imprisoned pro-democracy advocate, was moved to hospital while serving an 11-year jail term, because of his advanced terminal liver cancer.
His doctors in China say he is too ill to travel abroad for treatment, and must remain in China.
But medics from the US and Germany who examined Mr Liu disagree and say he could go abroad for palliative care.
Joseph Herman from the University of Texas' cancer centre and Markus Büchler of the University of Heidelberg surgery department, released a joint statement saying a medical evacuation would have to happen "as quickly as possible".

Friends of Liu Xiaobo and his wife say he is near death

"While a degree of risk always exists in the movement of any patient, both physicians believe Mr. Liu can be safely transported with appropriate medical evacuation care and support," they said.
Liu Xiaobo and his family have both asked that he be allowed to leave.
Mr Liu was a key leader in the famous Tiananmen Square protests in 1989, and has been a vocal advocate for full democracy in China since.
The state considers him a criminal dissident, and in 2009, sentenced him to 11 years in prison for subversive behaviour after he drafted a manifesto on democracy and human rights.
He was awarded the Nobel peace prize in 2010 for his "long and non-violent struggle".
"Through the severe punishment meted out to him, Liu has become the foremost symbol of this wide-ranging struggle for human rights in China," the Nobel Committee wrote.
He had more than three years remaining on his sentence when authorities moved him into a hospital.
Following his Nobel prize, Mr Liu's wife, a poet, was placed under house arrest, and has had her movements restricted ever since. 

She has never been charged with a crime.

The love that survived a Chinese labour camp

"I found all the beauty in the world in this one woman."
Their wedding banquet was in the labour camp's cafeteria, a scenario that would prove to be symbolic. 

Throughout their intense romance, the Chinese government was a relentless and interfering third wheel, the uninvited partner providing a constant backdrop to their interactions.
By all accounts, Liu Xiaobo and Liu Xia were inseparable, except when they were forcibly separated.

Beijing’s Nobel Shame

Trump should call on China to let a dying hero travel to the U.S. for care
The Washington Post

Protesters wear masks of Chinese Nobel Peace Prize laureate Liu Xiaobo. 

FOR TWO decades, Liu Xiaobo has been one of China’s foremost advocates of human rights and peaceful democratic reform. 

For that, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2010 — but he has also suffered unrelenting persecution and mistreatment by his own government. 

Now comes the ultimate abuse: Having failed to treat Mr. Liu for liver cancer until it was too late to do so, the regime of Xi Jinping has transferred him to a hospital in the city of Shenyang — so that it cannot be said that he died in prison. 

This cosmetic act of clemency should not stop the democratic world, led by the United States, from holding China up for condemnation for its unconscionable treatment of one of its most important freedom fighters.
Mr. Liu was a leader during the 1989 pro-democracy demonstrations in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square. But his most important contribution was his work in authoring Charter 08, a petition calling for freedom of association, an independent legal system, separation of powers and other elements of liberal governance that would allow China to “join the mainstream of civilized nations.” 

Mr. Liu was the first of more than 10,000 people who signed; for that he was arrested and, in 2009, sentenced to 11 years in prison. 

His wife, Liu Xia, was illegally placed under house arrest; anyone else who supported him was subjected to persecution.
When the Nobel Committee chose Mr. Liu, China became the first regime since Nazi Germany to prevent an honoree or their family members from traveling to Oslo. 

Since then, it has worked relentlessly to silence support for him abroad as well as at home, with lamentable success. 

Barack Obama spoke out only once on behalf of Mr. Liu, and many other Western leaders were altogether silent — intimidated by the punishments the regime inflicted on Norway after the Nobel was awarded. 

Since taking power in 2012, Xi has greatly increased repression of liberal voices, including not just democracy advocates but also liberal academics, journalists and lawyers who defend those subjected to abuses of power. 

He seems intent on establishing that China will never embrace the freedoms that Mr. Liu fought for.
On Tuesday , the State Department joined human rights activists in calling on China to allow Mr. Liu freedom to travel to a place of his own choosing for medical care. 

According to a U.S.-based advocate, Jared Genser, the 61-year-old dissident has asked authorities to allow him and his wife to travel to the United States.
But the U.S. statement came from a low-level official, the spokeswoman of the embassy in Beijing, when it ought to be delivered directly by President Trump to Xi. 
Mr. Liu’s case is a signal example of why China lacks the moral capacity to exercise global leadership. 
By advocating for this dying hero of human rights, Mr. Trump could show that the United States still lives by different values.

Beijing’s Nobel Shame

Liu Xiaobo will be remembered long after Xi Jinping is forgotten.
The Wall Street Journal

Liu Xiaobo, winner of the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize, is suffering from late-stage liver cancer, the world learned Monday. 

His lawyer says China has granted Mr. Liu “medical parole,” and he is receiving treatment in a Shenyang hospital. 

But Beijing can’t shirk responsibility for his condition, which should have been treated aggressively earlier, and for his years of incarceration and separation from his family, which were a cruel injustice.
China imprisoned Mr. Liu in 2008 and sentenced him to 11 years in prison for “incitement to subversion of state power.” 

His crime? 

He helped write Charter 08, a peaceful call for political reform signed by thousands of Chinese. 

The manifesto was based on Charter 77, a Soviet-era human-rights petition written by Czech dissidents including Vaclav Havel.
As the Nobel citation noted, “Liu has consistently maintained that the sentence violates both China’s own constitution and fundamental human rights.” 

Beijing continues to imprison anyone who protests its failure to abide by its own laws.
China also tries to punish foreign individuals and institutions that expose its human-rights abuses. 

That includes the nation of Norway, home to the Nobel Committee. 

After Mr. Liu won the Peace Prize, which is administered by a private foundation, Beijing curtailed diplomatic relations and trade on grounds that Norway had honored a “criminal.” 

Chinese authorities also put his wife, Liu Xia, under house arrest. 

Such ruthlessnees is a hallmark of the current generation of Chinese Communist rulers.
The world heard nothing directly from Mr. Liu during his nine years in prison, but his wife spoke to him shortly after his sentencing. 

“When he decides to do something, he doesn’t regret it,” she said. 

“He said he hopes to be the last person punished for practicing freedom of expression.” 

Long after the Communist Party is discarded and Xi Jinping is forgotten, Mr. Liu will be remembered as an historic figure in the fight for Chinese freedom.