As the Rule of Law Disappears, So Do Chinese Dissidents
By Chen Guangcheng, March 7, 2023, WSJ

There is no rule of law under the rule of the Chinese Communist Party. This simple truth contradicts the extensive facade of a legal system the party has constructed, from a constitution to an “independent” judiciary, which for decades has painted a
veneer of legitimacy over the regime’s abuses. But there is perhaps no clearer illustration of life under the yoke of Chinese authoritarianism than the case of Gao Zhisheng.

Born into a poor family in 1964, Mr. Gao trained as an attorney and became an integral member of the Rights Defense Movement—an effort by human-rights activists in the early 2000s to use the law and courts to force the authorities to abide by their own
rules. Mr. Gao was a bright light of this era and devoted a substantial portion of his work to politically sensitive pro bono cases. He was so skilled that before his more high-profile human-rights advocacy, the Ministry of Justice acknowledged him as “
one of the nation’s top 10 lawyers” for his work on public-interest cases.

For a brief time, before the Communist Party had the ability to control the internet widely, there seemed to be room for such people to maneuver in the country. In some instances, lawyers were able to push ground-breaking cases to successful outcomes. I
experienced this myself, when a case I brought to court in Beijing in 2003 led to the enforcement of a law that provided free access to public transportation for disabled people. We advanced these cases in court because the laws of the People’s
Republic of China supported us—at least on paper. Article 41 of the Constitution states that citizens “have the right to file with relevant state organs complaints, charges or reports against any state organ or state employee for violations of the
law.”

Yet these legal victories were short-lived. As a result of Mr. Gao’s human-rights work, the state revoked his legal license and shut down his law office in 2005. The following year he was sentenced to three years in prison plus five years probation on
charges of subversion of state power.

But Mr. Gao wasn’t intimidated. Denied the right to practice law, he availed himself of another constitutional freedom: the right to free speech. Mr. Gao launched a rolling hunger strike to bring attention to human-rights abuses (including my
persecution), wrote letters to the highest levels of the Communist Party leadership calling for an end to the persecution of Falun Gong practitioners, and openly condemned Beijing’s hosting of the 2008 Summer Olympics.

When it comes to Communist China, however, those who don’t bow to intimidation will be punished with an iron fist and a spiked steel boot. After a period of detention in 2007, Mr. Gao was attacked, hooded and abducted by authorities. For more than a
month he was held in a secret detention facility, where he was tortured. Reading his account of that experience is enough to freeze anyone’s blood.

Since that episode, Mr. Gao has been subjected to a constant cycle of prison, house arrest, fake trials and detentions—all at the whim of party thugs. At one point while under house arrest, Mr. Gao secretly managed to produce a memoir, rumored to be
smuggled out one page at a time. The manuscript, highly critical of the communist regime and explicit in its descriptions of his inhumane treatment, was published abroad. A year later, on Aug. 13, 2017, he was removed from his home without warning or
legal basis. No one has heard from him since.

Mr. Gao’s family has called the police and public security, demanding information and an investigation. They’ve hired a lawyer who has demanded to see his client. They might as well have been screaming into outer space. For cases like his, the only
relevant clause in all of the so-called legal codes drafted by the Chinese Communist Party is the one that states “it is necessary to maintain the leadership of the CCP.”

The regime is like a wild animal caught in a trap, driven by desperation to gnaw off its own foot. Imagine if people like Gao Zhisheng—the shining stars of a nation with unwavering devotion to ethics and justice—were allowed to flourish. China could
be a country to which others look for inspiration rather than with suspicion.

Mr. Gao deserves his freedom and his life. But as long as the free world allows this brutal regime to act with impunity, the list of the disappeared will grow.

Mr. Chen is a distinguished fellow at the Catholic University of America’s Center for Human Rights and author of “The Barefoot Lawyer: A Blind Man’s Fight for Justice and Freedom in China.”

https://www.wsj.com/articles/as-the-rule-of-law-disappears-so-do-chinese-dissidents-authoritarianism-gao-zhisheng-ccp-human-rights-prison-60b48976

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)