Three months after his release from prison, the dissident veteran Chen Yunfei is in the police reticle for his publications on social networks and has faced several cycles of questioning and harassment in the middle of the current surveillance, Radio Free Asia learned.
Human rights activist based in Chengdu and Chinese performance artist was released on March 24 after serving a four-year prison sentence in the southwest province of Sichuan. But his friends say that his freedom was largely illusory, because the police summoned him several times for interrogations and has seriously limited his movements and his ability to resume work.
Chen faced a repeated persecution for his criticism from the Chinese Communist Party and the commemoration of the 1989 Tiananmen demonstrations, including the requirements that the government is investigating for repression and compensating the victims. In 2021, he was sentenced to four years in prison in matters of sexual assault for the child he denied and declared was intended to dirty his reputation.
More recently, on the eve of the 36th anniversary of June 4, 1989, the protests of Tiananmen Square protested the repression, the National Security Office and the local police submitted to a five -hour interrogation, where he was forced to sit on the “ tiger bench, ‘said the friend of Chen and colleague Guan on Wednesday.
The “tiger bench” is a form of torture used to retain and immobilize the prisoners during the interrogation. Chen, like many other FRGs interviewed for this story, asked to be identified only by a single name for fear of reprisals.
“Police have accused him of” picking quarrels and causing problems, “said Guan, referring to a criminal accusation frequently used by Chinese authorities to make arbitrary detentions against activists and rights of rights.
The accusations were based on the activity of Chen’s social media, in particular the republication of the tweets of Ming Chu-Cheng, honorary professor of politics at the National University of Taiwan, and the leading dissidents Wang Yi, the pastor of a Protestant church prohibited in Chengdu, and the citizen journalist Cai Chu, said Guan.
Despite the absence of an assignment, the police summoned Chen for interrogation, confiscating his mobile phone and his Wi-Fi equipment for three days, before returning them on June 3 after repeated demonstrations, said Guan.
Chen’s means of subsistence were also affected, said friends. At his release from prison, Chen found that his nursery business, which he had operated for many years, was emptied of all the active, which made him lose his source of income, said Yang, another friend of the activist.
The courts also listed it as a “dishonest debtor”, preventing him from accessing his bank accounts or taking over work, Yang said.
“He is now having trouble renting a house and can only survive on donations from friends and by loans,” said Fang Liang, another friend of Chen’s.
“ Secondary Punishment ”
During the most recent imprisonment of Chen, his 91 -year -old mother was also with force and violently withdrawn from her housekeeper from Chengdu by community workers, during which she underwent a head of the head which required more than a month of hospitalization, said Guan.
During forced expulsion, many family value assets disappeared, including $ 30,000 of pension that his mother had put aside for the education of her granddaughter abroad, $ 5,800 in cash and around 40,000 yuan (or US $ 5,560) in Chinese currency, said Guan.
When Chen tried to submit a police report after discovering his empty house for his release, the authorities refused to present a receipt or open an investigation, Yang said.
“They don’t allow you to have evidence to continue them,” said Yang. “The government said it was not their responsibility, and the police said that the community simply pushed the case in both directions.”
Despite the current harassment, Chen’s friends say that he is preparing to bring civil action to recover his mother’s lost property and challenge the abuse of police power.
The legal scientist based on the Shandong, read, described the problems in the course of Chen as the consequence of a typical model of “secondary punishment” designed to maintain control of dissidents by non -judicly means.
“The administrative examination is inactive, the police do not deliberately issue receipts, and elderly mothers are forced to become homeless,” said it is not the application of the law, but political coercion. ”
Written by Tenzin Pema. Edited by Mat Pennington.