China detains charter co-organizer in Nobel crackdown

Nation newspaper, Dec.11 2010

Beijing - China has detained the co-organizer of the Charter '08 for democratic reform amid a sweeping crackdown on activists ahead of Friday's award ceremony for the Nobel Peace Prize, rights groups said.

Police seized Zhang Zuhua as he was returning home from lunch on Thursday, forcing him into a van and taking him away, the Hong Kong-based China Human Rights Defenders reported.

Zhang was one of the main organizers of Charter '08 with Liu Xiaobo, the jailed dissident writer awarded this year's Nobel Peace Prize. The detention of Zhang came "amid a wave of disappearances and threats" against scores of activists ahead of the Nobel award ceremony in Oslo, the group said.

Nation newspaper article in full

BB's note: the article goes on to articulate how Chinese authorities are trying to plug all the leaks - relating to friends and/or family of Liu Xiaobo (the Nobel prize winner). It's a tough job, but Chinese heavies are up to the task. They've had a lot of practice in the art of suppression, intimidation, cutting off outside contacts (blanking out mobile phone numbers, etc) and generally stomping their boot heels on the aspirations of Chinese citizens.

They managed to get a lot of countries to stay at home just by saying something along the lines of 'We'll be very disappointed with anyone who decides to go'.

Lots of people (who should know better) are praising how China is emerging as such a world player. Of course, most of those people, like big shot billionaire investors from western countries, see everything with dollars in their eyes.

The reality is that China, despite having a fast growing economy, is still stuck in its archaic and oppressive ways. It has no real democracy at it's top echelons. There are no realistic ways for wronged regular citizens to voice their concerns. China condemns interference in rogues states like N.Korea, Zimbabwe and Burma, yet is hyper-interfering with Tibet and Taiwan. China allows the US and Nato to go in and do the dirty work in Iraq and Afghanistan, and then, when the dust settles, it saunters in and makes business deals with the locals.

Are there any Chinese institutions which assist disadvantaged people outside its borders?