Hunan human rights activist and citizen journalist Ou Biaofeng was summoned and detained by Zhuzhou City State Security after Dong Yaoqiong broke her two-year silence and tweeted about the scandal of her mental illness. The police have transferred Ou Biaofeng from administrative detention to residential surveillance, and his current place of detention is unknown. This is the latest case of a human rights defender and citizen journalist being investigated and prosecuted by the authorities in China on felony charges of subversion. Ou Biaofeng, who has been targeted by the authorities for a long time, has been able to maintain communication with the woman who publicly humiliated the top leader of the Chinese Communist Party and was “stabilized” by the ink thrower, and assisted her in speaking out.
Ou Biaofeng’s wife: Dong Yaoqiong’s video was the trigger
On May 22, 2020, Ou Biaofeng tweeted that Dong Yaoqiong had been sent to a psychiatric hospital again.
“The day before the expiration of the 15-day administrative detention period, about 12 police officers came to search the house, taking away his computer, cell phone, iPad, as well as his home “no freedom, no death” banner, Apple Daily, and some of his bank cards, copied these things away. ” Ou Biaofeng’s wife, Wei Huanhuan, briefly described to the Voice of America reporter who called to ask about the raid on his home and warned her not to give interviews to foreign media. “Then they told me privately that because of the suspicion of subversion of state power, then it was turned into residential surveillance. The notice will come down today or tomorrow.”
Ou Biao Feng, 40, who has two young sons and lives in Ningxiang near Changsha, is known as Xiao Biao, and has been summoned and taken away by Zhuzhou police for more than 20 days.
Wei Huanhuan said that the police had previously let the wind out of her sails, and she was not surprised that her husband Xiao Biao was targeted and convicted by the authorities for speaking out against Dong Yaoqiong, but she still felt that it was sudden, and Dong Yaoqiong’s video was the trigger.
Wei Huanhuan, a graduate of China University of Political Science and Law, said that at least a year or two before that, the state security warned Ou Biao Feng and was making materials for him. She said that many of the things Ou Biaofeng has done since he became involved in the civil movement and human rights cause have probably been documented by the authorities. And this time it is a breakthrough or a trigger because Dong Yaoqiong’s matter is so sensitive that a higher level is on his radar.
Using online social media platforms to exercise freedom of expression
As a civil rights activist and “grassroots” citizen journalist, Ou Biaofeng’s main channels for speaking out are the walled microblog and the overseas social media platform Twitter. The profile of his real-name Twitter account shows that he opened an account in June 2011 and currently has 52,200 followers. The profile has only one line, in traditional Chinese traditional characters: Political Awakening, Civil Disobedience! It never ends…
His top tweet is a musical film (MTV) showing the images of Liu Xiaobo, 709 lawyers and human rights defenders, among many other Chinese prisoners of conscience and political prisoners who have been imprisoned, titled “Prisoner Song”.
On December 3, Ou Biao Feng sent his last tweet: “Taken away from Ningxiang by four Zhuzhou state security guards and police officers, I arrived in Zhuzhou at around 12:30 p.m. After having lunch in the city, I arrived at the Lusong Branch of Zhuzhou Public Security Bureau at around 2 p.m. I waited in the duty room on the first floor until now, and a uniformed police officer was arranged to guard me, saying that the head of the state security branch who wanted to see me had not yet come.”
“As a civilian like him, without any power and background, the most he has is his tweets, and the words he feels and thinks he can’t send out.” Ou Biao Feng’s wife Wei Huanhuan told Voice of America. “How can these things go to subvert a country? Basic freedoms, in some countries, are just basic civil rights.”
Wei Huanhuan pointed out that even if Ou Biaofeng keeps in touch with Dong Yaoqiong, it’s only online comments. She does not believe this constitutes “subversion of state power.
Dong Yaoqiong contacted Ou Biaofeng before posting the video
Dong Yaoqiong, who was shocked by the ink throwing incident, suddenly posted a video online on Nov. 30 after being out of sight for more than two years, revealing that she was “mentally ill” and under surveillance, protesting that she could not freely contact the outside world or even her family, and saying that she was no longer afraid and calling for attention.
Ou Biaofeng told Voice of America the night before he was taken away by police that he had told Dong Yaoqiong’s father, Dong Jianbiao, that he had just escaped from a mine disaster in Leiyang, Hunan province, and that Dong Yaoqiong was so emotional at the news that he broke his silence that night and tweeted his cry. Ou Biao Feng said he had retweeted two tweets with pictures thanking God on behalf of Dong Yaoqiong at her request the day before. Currently, neither those tweets nor the retweeted video of Dong Yaoqiong pleading for help exist.
Independent writer Li Xuewen, who is familiar with Oubiao Feng’s experience in civil rights activism, told VOA that Dong Yaoqiong became angry when her father was spared from the mine disaster and could not be contacted because of stability maintenance, but the Hunan police saw Dong Yaoqiong’s video as a major provocation to the stability maintenance department, so they silenced Dong Yaoqiong again and then settled the score with Oubiao Feng.
The place of detention is unknown, and it is believed that the captain of the State Security is involved in the case.
Ou Biaofeng, who has long been concerned about the human rights situation in China, supports democracy and freedom, and helps the underprivileged in society, has been placed under surveillance by the police on aggravated charges, a development that is of great concern to the outside world.
Hunan rights activist Chen Siming told VOA that on December 19, the day after Ou Biaofeng’s home was searched and his personal belongings taken away, he and several fellow human rights activists approached Zhuzhou City police to inquire about Ou Biaofeng’s place of detention and asked the authorities to guarantee the right to meet with his lawyer. Chen Siming also said that several of them went to the detention center where Ou Biao Feng was previously held to deposit money for him, but they were told that the person was not there, and he deduced that he had been taken to another place of detention.
Chen Siming said that the outside world is particularly worried about Ou Biao Feng’s torture. When he expressed this concern to the police, Chen said he was assured that Ou would not be tortured.
Recently, the U.S. government announced sanctions against Chinese police officer Huang Yuanxiong of Wucun Police Station in Xiamen, Fujian Province, on World Human Rights Day, in addition to sanctions against senior Communist Party officials, as a deterrent to grassroots police officers who violate citizens’ human rights. The decision to sanction Huang Yuanxiong is believed to be based on his involvement in human rights violations such as interrogations and detentions of Falun Gong practitioners who exercise their right to freedom of belief.
In 2017, the U.S. government sanctioned Gao Yan, the head of Beijing’s Chaoyang District Public Security Bureau, under the Global Magnitsky Act, who is believed to be involved in the death of Chinese rights activist Ms. Cao Shunli.
Hunan State Security is known to have repeatedly warned relevant individuals not to follow Ou Biaofeng’s case, not to give interviews to foreign media, and not to reveal the identity names of those handling the case. Judging from the last message tweeted by Ou Biaofeng before he was lost, the head of the Zhuzhou City State Security Branch was directly involved in handling the case. The fact that Ou Biaofeng’s retweets about Dong Yaoqiong were deleted after he was lost also suggests that his arrest was a response to an appeal by the stability maintenance department for Dong Yaoqiong to break out of her confinement and blockade.
Daughter tweets, father under surveillance
Dong Yaoqiong has not made a new sound since she sent a video appealing for help. The video and several tweets she sent at the time have all disappeared from her Twitter account.
Dong Yaoqiong’s father, Dong Jianbiao, recently told VOA that after escaping from the mine disaster, he was sent home from the Yuanjiangshan coal mine in Leiyang City to be monitored by Zhuzhou City police in early December, and that the local government sent a Communist Party member to watch over him and forbade him to travel outside the city.
He said he was told that when his freedom would be returned would depend on instructions from the Ministry of Public Security in Beijing.
Dong Jianbiao said he has not heard from Dong Yaoqiong since he contacted him once via WeChat, not even a word of greeting. Not long ago, the miner, who escaped death, told the Voice of America that he was about to return home to see his daughter to understand the situation.
Dong Jianbiao disclosed to reporters that more than 10 workers digging coal with him had died, and Dong Jianbiao was one of the two who managed to escape. He said that another person was resting at the time, and he pulled the brother up and ran to safety together. However, the mine management and the local government did not say anything about his rescue, and after taking a statement, the Zhuzhou public security sent him back to his hometown to monitor him, making him feel overwhelmed by the authorities’ high-handedness.
Subversion is a counter-revolutionary crime, and the authorities consider it a contradiction between us and the enemy.
It is reported that the Apple Daily, which was seized by the police from Ou Biao Feng’s car, contains news about the 2020 anti-centralization movement in Hong Kong and the arrest of Hong Kong liberal media personality Lai Chi-ying. When the Occupy Central incident occurred in Hong Kong a few years ago, Au expressed his support for the democratic demands of Hong Kong people. Years ago, Ou Biao Feng led foreign media reporters to cover the tomb of Li Wangyang, who was suicided in Shaoyang, Hunan Province. After Dong Yaoqiong was lost in the ink-spilling incident, Ou Biao Feng was almost the only source that could provide information.
According to independent writer Li Xuewen, Ou Biaofeng is a human rights defender and citizen journalist who has been active both online and offline for nearly a decade, and is a man of passion.
Chen Siming, who has been administratively detained several times for commemorating June 4, is a Christian civil rights activist. He says that under the Communist Party’s authoritarian system, both the crime of “provoking and provoking trouble” and the crime of “subversion” are “pocket crimes” that are often abused under the authoritarian system, which has no real rule of law or independent judiciary. The former can be sentenced to administrative detention, not residential surveillance or criminal detention, and can be regarded as an internal conflict within the people, while the latter is a tool to maintain the dictatorship, equivalent to the “counter-revolutionary crime” in the Mao era, and belongs to the “conflict between the enemy and me”. Once charged with this crime, he could be sentenced in any way he wanted. He believes that even so, Ou Biao Feng’s comments and actions fall within the scope of the rights of citizens and do not violate the laws enacted by the Chinese Communist Party.
Dong Yaoqiong’s father, Dong Jianbiao, said he was worried when he learned through a WeChat group that their groupmate “Xiao Biao,” also known as Ou Biaofeng, had been convicted of subversion of state power, and he hoped Ou Biaofeng would be freed.
Criticism of Xi – the most sensitive nerve of the authorities?
Some analysts pointed out that Dong Yaoqiong was regarded as an important object of stability maintenance by Hunan authorities after she spilled ink, and because the matter involved the top leader of the Communist Party, Ou Biao Feng’s help in tweeting Dong Yaoqiong was considered to have breached a sensitive red line.
Chen Siming said he felt the same way about this. “Where is the sensitivity of the police?” He noted, “It’s in Xi Jinping. Criticize the Communist Party, they might tolerate it. You try criticizing Xi Jinping? It’s immediate, immediate effect. So, Dong Yaoqiong’s matter involves a sensitive nerve, Xi Jinping. Xiao Biao is only involved, but not directly criticize Xi Jinping. So now in this Chinese society, everyone in the mention of Xi Jinping’s name have to think about it. It’s not like the old days when you could say Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin or Hu Jintao and it would come out of your mouth. Now they need a certain amount of guts and courage to criticize Xi Jinping, after a certain amount of thinking, before they dare to say those three words. This is a very sad phenomenon.”
Before the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC) and after the “constitutional amendment” by the National People’s Congress (NPC), which was called a “rubber stamp,” there was a craze in China similar to the idolization of Mao Zedong during the Cultural Revolution. performance art took place in a number of places in China and abroad. Conspicuously, propaganda boards such as Xi Jinping’s statue, which had been scattered throughout the streets of Chinese cities, were removed almost overnight.
However, Chinese citizens who criticize the Communist Party leader, both inside and outside the system, continue to be severely targeted by the authorities, though not always for “subversion,” and in some cases on other trumped-up charges such as “corruption,” “arrogantly discussing the Central Committee,” and “lack of respect.
According to Chen Siming, a citizen of Zhuzhou, Hunan Province, China has signed the UN Covenant on Political Rights, and freedom of expression is an important political right for citizens to express and exchange ideas, while citizen criticism of the government is the highest form of patriotism.
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