A BLIND activist who was jailed after highlighting the plight of women, including cases of forced abortions and other abuses, was released from a Chinese prison yesterday but remained under heavy surveillance.
Chen Guangcheng, now 39, was jailed in 2006 on trumped-up charges of disturbing the peace and traffic offences. His case marked the start of a government crackdown on activist lawyers.
He was escorted back to his village in the eastern province of Shandong yesterday, where his family has been under surveillance for several days, and 24-hour closed-circuit video cameras have been set up in the village to monitor their movements.
Activists in China routinely face such restrictions, referred to as ruan jinor "soft detention" by the police. Mr Chen was jailed because he wrote a report about the status of women in Linyi, an area of some 10 million residents. The report revealed how family planning officials there enforced China's "one-child policy".
The report said tens of thousands of people who had an illegal number of children and were ineligible to have more were coerced into late-term abortions, and forced to have sterilisations.
Mr Chen’s wife, Yuan Weijing, was waiting to meet him with their two small children. She has had a tough time since his incarceration – her freedom of movement has been restricted, and she has been harassed and beaten up.
Mr Chen’s health deteriorated during his time in prison, his relatives said, because he was not given the right medication for frequent bouts of food poisoning.
He went blind as a child and is a self-taught lawyer, who was not allowed to graduate in Shandong province because of his disability. He listened in to classes and, like many so-called “barefoot lawyers”, used what legal skills he has to represent his fellow villagers.
He always maintained he was only trying to force local officials to abide by the rights enshrined in China’s constitution, but his activism brought him into regular conflict with the local authorities.
“We are thrilled that he is finally released, he should never have been imprisoned in the first place,” said Corinna-Barbara Francis from the China team of Amnesty International.