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Republican congressman Chris Smith of New Jersey is chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee panel that convened the hearing in Washington on Thursday. Photo: Bloomberg

US must ‘publicly and consistently’ press China to release its political prisoners, Congress told

  • House Foreign Affairs panel hears testimony from wife of detained human rights lawyer Gao Zhisheng and others seeking stronger approach by Washington
  • Congress also urged to boost transparency obligations on American businesses operating in Hong Kong to make it harder for activists to be prosecuted

The US must “publicly and consistently” call for the release of political prisoners in China, impose transparency obligations on American businesses in Hong Kong and increase resources for young Chinese activists, witnesses told a subcommittee of the House Foreign Affairs Committee on Thursday.

The hearing was titled “Where is Gao Zhisheng?” in reference to a human rights lawyer who rose to international prominence for defending members of the banned spiritual movement Falun Gong and championing farmers’ land rights in China.
Gao was last seen in 2017. His wife, Geng He, along with Sophie Luo, the wife of human rights lawyer Ding Jiaxi, were among two of six witnesses testifying at Thursday’s hearing in Washington.

Geng made an emotional plea for help to secure her husband’s freedom, beseeching US officials in China to visit Gao and ask Beijing to make his trial public and grant him visitation rights.

But if this could not be achieved, Geng said, “it’s OK [at least] to have Gao Zhisheng give me a call to tell me he’s still alive”.

“Gao Zhisheng has been kidnapped without trial for nearly six years without any news, which is a real evil in the world,” she added.

Meanwhile, Andrew Bremberg, president of the Washington-based Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, testified that the US “must publicly and consistently call for the unconditional release of all political prisoners in China and do so by name”.

Earlier this month, Ding and legal scholar Xu Zhiyong were sentenced by a court in Shandong province for subverting state power: Xu for 14 years and Ding for 12. In February, Ding was honoured by the US State Department as a “global human rights defender”.
Luo spoke of how Xu and her husband were subjected to inhumane conditions after being put in detention following a gathering with a group of activists in Fujian province. She noted that Xu’s girlfriend was still being detained for supporting him.

As of 2022, more than 2,500 people have been detained or imprisoned in China, according to the political prisoners database collected by the Congressional-Executive Commission on China (CECC), a bipartisan, bicameral panel that advises Congress on human rights and rule of law in China.

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Yaqiu Wang of New York-based Human Rights Watch at Thursday’s hearing described cases of young ‘white-paper’ protesters who were detained in China last year after speaking out against the government’s zero-Covid lockdowns.
She urged the US government to show support for the younger generation in China who “are waking up to the [Chinese Communist Party’s] brutal repression”.

One possible approach was to increase scholarships and resources for students and young activists to come to the US and engage in exchange with their counterparts, Wang said.

Bob Fu, president of China Aid Association, a US-based Christian rights group, said American leaders should go beyond highlighting cases in bilateral and multilateral forums and visit the family members of political prisoners now living in the US.

Xi Jinping himself is watching whether human rights and prisoners of conscience matter to our foreign policy and to the mind for leaders,” he testified, referring to the Chinese leader.

The Chinese embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the hearing.

Witnesses also spoke about the Chinese government’s transnational targeting of activists and surveillance technology deployed to identify dissidents at home. They called on the US government to examine data collection on apps used by the Chinese diaspora and loopholes in enforcing the Uygur Forced Labour Prevention Act.

Beijing slams ‘bully’ US over annual Hong Kong report to Congress

Thomas Kellogg, executive director at Georgetown University’s Centre for Asian Law, testified that the situation in Hong Kong “is not as bad as the situation on the mainland” but that Beijing’s imposition of the national security law on the city had led to the “worst moment that I’ve seen” in 20 years.

Kellogg urged Congress to examine legislation that would enhance transparency obligations on American businesses operating in Hong Kong to make it harder for activists to be prosecuted.

Congress could compel businesses to disclose any information requests that they were obliged to provide to the Hong Kong government, he said.

Republican congressman Chris Smith of New Jersey, chair of the subcommittee hosting the hearing and of the CECC, said he would introduce a bill to call for the release of Gao, Ding and others as a result of Thursday’s hearing.

Smith also promised to push “very, very hard” to pass a bill he introduced to revoke China’s permanent normal trading status privileges, in addition to forwarding a bill he sponsored calling for the closure of Hong Kong Economic and Trade Offices in the US.
He added he would look into proposing sanctions targeting two officials under the Global Magnitsky Act that Geng flagged as being involved in her husband’s case.

“I don’t care who is in the White House,” said Smith. “We all have an obligation, I think a moral duty, that’s not easily satisfied, to stand for the weakest, most vulnerable and the oppressed.”

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