The report of the detention of Xu Zhiyong, a civil rights lawyer, was a reminder that, for all the attention given to Mr Ai’s release, many more activists are still being held.

The scores of formal arrests, unofficial detentions and unexplained disappearances in recent months mark China’s most intense period of repression since the crackdown following the Tiananmen protests in 1989, campaigners say ….

“There is no doubt that, after the Arab spring, the authorities launched a comprehensive effort to redefine the limits of permissible expression,” said Nicholas Bequelin, of Human Rights Watch in Hong Kong. “The government came to the conclusion that the only way to rein in criticism was to physically take the critics off the grid,” he said ….

Mr Xu, the lawyer, went missing on Wednesday, according to Human Rights Watch. A news official in the national public security bureau said she was not aware of any arrest. Mr Xu’s phone was turned off. Previously jailed in 2009, Mr Xu had been helping people trying to run as independents in local elections.

Xu himself successfully ran for the People’s Congress in Beijing’s Haidian district in 2003. He has been involved in an extremely wide range of issues, most recently the pursuit of equal education rights for students regardless of their hukou status. From a 2009 LA Times article published following an earlier detention in 2009:

Xu’s law firm was one of the few in China willing to represent the parents of the nearly 300,000 children sickened and the six who died last year as a result of dangerous milk additives.

Since its founding in 2003, the firm, also known as Gongmeng, has not shied away from sensitive topics. It challenged China’s secret detention centers, the so-called black jails, after a 27-year-old graphic designer who was arrested for failing to carry his identification card died in custody. Xu represented an editor of the hard-hitting newspaper Southern Metropolis Daily who was arrested in 2004 on what were widely seen as politically motivated bribery charges.

This summer, Xu’s firm joined the chorus of voices opposing a requirement that all computers sold in China come preinstalled with software that would filter out pornographic or controversial content.

But Xu is by no means a dissident, preferring to work within a system he has hoped to improve, not overthrow.

Xu’s organisation, like Ai Weiwei’s, was accused of tax evasion, but the charges collapsed last August. Read more about Xi Zhiyong via CDT.

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Post tags: Ai Weiwei, detention, Green Dam, Haidian, human rights watch, lawyers, milk contamination, Xu Zhiyong
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The Beijing police department said Wednesday that Ai Weiwei has been released on bail because of his good attitude in confessing his crimes as well as a chronic disease he suffers from.

The decision comes also in consideration of the fact that Ai has repeatedly said he is willing to pay the taxes he evaded, police said.

The Beijing Fake Cultural Development Ltd., a company Ai controlled, was found to have evaded a huge amount of taxes and intentionally destroyed accounting documents, police said.

From The Guardian:

Ai’s younger brother Ai Dan told the Guardian he had no information on his brother. The artist’s wife and mother could not be reached immediately and Ai’s phone remained switched off.

NPR’s Louisa Lim, however, reported on Twitter that:

Ai Weiwei’s mother Gao Ying said she’d only heard about his release through the media, no idea when he’d be back. “We won’t sleep tonight”

…and:

Ai Weiwei’s mother Gao Ying said she didn’t want to comment on Ai’s confession until she’d talked to son, and seen his condition

Further details will be posted as they emerge.

Update: Independent confirmation of Ai’s release has come, first from his lawyer, Liu Xiaoyuan, who tweeted “I sent Ai Weiwei a text message at 11 o’clock. He just replied: he’s out!” Liu also stated (via Louisa Lim) that tax evasion need not carry criminal liability as long as due taxes are repaid.

Ai has arrived back at his studio, apparently looking thinner than before.

ITV’s Angus Walker pointed out that the release comes on the eve of Wen Jiabao’s trip to Germany and the UK; it might therefore have been intended to set a favourable tone for the visit.

There is no news of other missing members of Ai’s circle.

Update: The Telegraph recounted a carefully guarded conversation with Ai following his return home:

“I’m out, I’m back at home,” Mr Ai told The Daily Telegraph by phone, his voice notably softer than before his incarceration, “please understand, however, that I cannot accept interviews”. Asked how he was treated while in detention, Mr Ai again deferred to his bail conditions, but hinted that there were no imminent court proceedings against him. “I am out on bail for one year, that is all I can say,” he added.

Asked whether his bail would also prevent him using Twitter – a medium he used prolifically before his arrest – Mr Ai only managed a tired laugh, repeating apologetically that he was unable to speak further.

The New York Times provides more detail on Ai’s legal situation, as well as current photographs of the artist:

“Bail” is the shorthand commonly used as an English translation of the Chinese term “qubao houshen,” which means obtaining a guarantee pending trial [but see Siweiluozi's proposed alternative translation, "obtaining a guarantee pending further investigation"]. It generally means that prosecutors have decided to drop charges against a suspect on certain conditions, including good behavior, and subject to monitoring during over a period of time during which charges could be reintroduced.

“This is a technique that the public security authorities sometimes use as a face-saving device to end controversial cases that are unwise or unnecessary for them to prosecute,” Jerome A. Cohen, a scholar of the Chinese legal system, said in an e-mail. “Often in such cases a compromise has been reached in negotiation with the suspect, as apparently it has been here.”

Mr. Cohen said Mr. Ai’s release “is very good news and perhaps the very best outcome that could have been expected in the circumstances of this difficult case ….”

Mr. Cohen said the circumstances of “qubao houshen” usually meant that the detainee had agreed to limitations on his or her behavior, and that the case could be quietly dropped if the detainee adheres to that agreement and other compromises made. Legally, the police can continue to pursue the case for up to one year. During that time, the suspect is allowed freedom of movement, but the police generally hold on to the person’s travel documents.

Cohen discussed the situation at greater length on the U.S. Asia Law Institute site:

It is important to remember that, although the announcement claims Ai has “confessed his crimes”, no formal charge has ever been made against him; he was apparently not even formally arrested” (逮捕), not to mention indicted (起诉). Ai has thus not had to plead guilty to any crimes, although the term “renzui” (认罪), or admitting guilt, has been used in the press report. He can end the tax obligations by payment with interest, and perhaps a fine, as the press report says he is willing to do.

The decision to grant QBHS has little to do with the rule of law, but everything to do with the untramelled exercise of discretion enjoyed by Chinese authorities. This outcome makes clear that great international public pressure plus significant domestic and personal guanxi (关系, connections) can be a potent combination even in the case of someone who went further than anyone before him in openly thumbing his nose (and other body parts) at the Communist regime. Undoubtedly, Ai’s star talent, his family history and global support from the artistic community helped a lot.

An article in the Guardian was dismissive of suggestions that Ai’s release deliberately coincided with Wen’s Europe visit:

“I think the timing is one of coincidence rather than a deliberate signal,” said Roderic Wye, a China analyst from the Chatham House thinktank. “In the post-Tiananmen days, there was the occasional high-profile person released, but usually before a US presidential visit rather than a trip to Europe, with all due respect to our leaders. The whole point for China is: we don’t give in to pressure these days, China is big enough to make its own decisions without taking foreign pressure into account.”

Elsewhere at the Guardian, however, Human Rights Watch’s Nicholas Bequelin placed greater weight on the role of international pressure:

“His detention was political and his release is political. It is the result of a huge domestic and international outcry that forced the government to this resolution … I think Beijing realised how damaging it was to hold China’s most famous artist in detention,” he said.

Amnesty International similarly noted the timing, along with the continuing detention of Ai’s associates and the risk that his release might lead into a long and harsh period of house arrest like that of Chen Guangcheng.

“His release on bail can be seen as a tokenistic move by the government to deflect mounting criticism.” said Catherine Baber, Amnesty International’s Deputy Director for the Asia Pacific.

“It is vital that the international outcry over Ai Weiwei be extended to those activists still languishing in secret detention or charged with inciting subversion.”

Amnesty International is calling for the immediate release of Ai Weiwei’s four associates Wen Tao, Hu Mingfen, Liu Zhenggang and Zhang Jinsong, who all disappeared into secret detention after Ai was detained ….

“While Ai Weiwei’s release is an important step, he must now be granted his full liberty, and not be held in illegal house arrest as has been the pattern with so many others recently released from arbitrary detention.” said Catherine Baber.

In keeping with the “one out, one in” pattern of releases and detentions, Beijing human rights lawyer Xu Zhiyong has now been detained, according to Weibo reports. Xu has recently been quoted in connection with China’s independent candidate movement, having successfully run for the People’s Congress in Beijing’s Haidian district in 2003. He has been involved in an extremely wide range of issues, most recently the pursuit of equal education rights for students regardless of their hukou status. From a 2009 LA Times article published following an earlier detention in 2009:

Xu’s law firm was one of the few in China willing to represent the parents of the nearly 300,000 children sickened and the six who died last year as a result of dangerous milk additives.

Since its founding in 2003, the firm, also known as Gongmeng, has not shied away from sensitive topics. It challenged China’s secret detention centers, the so-called black jails, after a 27-year-old graphic designer who was arrested for failing to carry his identification card died in custody. Xu represented an editor of the hard-hitting newspaper Southern Metropolis Daily who was arrested in 2004 on what were widely seen as politically motivated bribery charges.

This summer, Xu’s firm joined the chorus of voices opposing a requirement that all computers sold in China come preinstalled with software that would filter out pornographic or controversial content.

But Xu is by no means a dissident, preferring to work within a system he has hoped to improve, not overthrow.

Xu’s organisation, like Ai Weiwei’s, was accused of tax evasion, but the charges collapsed last August. Read more about Xi Zhiyong via CDT.

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Post tags: Ai Weiwei, Ai Weiwei detention 2011, detention, Gongmeng, Green Dam, Haidian, milk contamination, Southern Metropolis Daily, Xinhua, Xu Zhiyong
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Last Friday, a mysterious person tipped us that the office of the Green Dam-Youth Escort Software Project in the Beijing Huajie Building has been closed down with all workers being sent away. That day, our reporter went to Room B411 in the Beijing Huajie Building during office hours. The door was padlocked and the inside was barren with without any desks, chairs or other office facilities.

The Green Dam project was run jointly by the Beijing Dazheng Language Recognition and Processing Research Institute and the Zhengzhou Jinhui Computer System Engineering Limited Company. The Beijing Dazheng general manager Chen Xiaomeng acknowledged that their office in the Huajie Building had been shut down at the end of last month and the more than 30 workers have been sent off.

There are still workers from Zhengzhou and they are also being sent off gradually. “These workers cannot come back to work at the Beijing Dazheng because they were workers for the Green Dam project for the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. We cannot just take over.”

Chen Xiaomeng said that the Green Dam-Youth Escort project was established in May 2008. Zhengzhou Jinhui’s and Beijing Dazheng’s won the bid. These two products were later combined to form the Green Dam-Youth Escort software. The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology paid 41.7 million yuan for the software which was to be downloaded by citizens for free.

“We really lack financial support. We hung on for a year now, but we really cannot go on.” Yesterday, Chen Xiaomeng said that the government paid 41.7 million yuan, of which Beijing Dazheng received 19.9 million yuan and Zhengzhou Jinhui received 21.8 million yuan. But this only covered the expenses for one year from 2008 to 2009. Since last year, the two companies have not received a cent to cover operating expenses.

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Post tags: Green Dam, Internet censorship
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China is doing its best to remind us that technology can also be a tool of suppression, with Beijing recommitting to censoring its large corner of the Internet. Last summer, the authorities required computer makers to install “Green Dam” software on every PC sold in China, which would block troubling political and religious sites. The regulation was put on hold. But last week a Santa Barbara-based company called Cybersitter sued China and several computer makers for $2.2 billion for allegedly stealing code from its parental-control software aimed at blocking pornography.

The lawsuit—which faces an uphill climb because of difficulties in fighting global copyright violations—says makers of the Green Dam software lifted 3,000 lines of code from Cybersitter (even including some of its customer updates) and incorporated them into the Chinese software. Violations of rights to software in China are usually on display as close as the nearest side street, but it’s telling that the government would go to such lengths.

Cybersitter alleges there were several thousand attempts from China to hack into its servers, some with thousands of attempts at access per session, including one traced back to a government ministry. Spoofed emails originating in China purported to come from Cybersitter staff and attempted to install Trojan code to lift information from the company’s servers.

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Post tags: Great Firewall, Green Dam, Internet control
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China was accused of piracy in a lawsuit filed by a California software maker, which said the Green Dam Youth Escort filtering program installed on personal computers in the country infringes its copyright.

Cybersitter LLC, a closely held company, seeks $2.2 billion in damages in a complaint filed yesterday in federal court in Los Angeles. The company accuses China and computer makers, including Lenovo Group Ltd. and Acer Inc. whose products include the Green Dam program, of stealing its trade secrets, unfair competition, copyright infringement and civil conspiracy.

“This lawsuit aims to strike a blow against the all-too- common practices of foreign software manufacturers and distributors who believe that they can violate the intellectual property rights of small American companies with impunity without being brought to justice in U.S. courts,” Greg Fayer, a lawyer representing Cybersitter, said in a statement.

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Post tags: Green Dam, Internet censorship, software piracy
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Chinese Web users have no impact on the government. Fact: In June, China unveiled plans to require all new personal computers to come with filtering software “Green Dam Youth Escort,” but an outcry from Chinese Web users and foreign technology companies forced the government to rethink. It would have been too embarrassing to abandon it completely, but the government postponed indefinitely the mandatory pre-installation of the software on new computers. Some Asian brands, including Acer and Lenovo, agreed to put it in package anyway. Eventually the government announced that schools, Internet cafés and other public-use computers would still be required to run the software.

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Post tags: 2009, China coverage, Green Dam, online activism, views of China
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Solid Oak Software, the Santa Barbara, Calif.-based maker of Internet filter CYBERsitter, on Monday filed a $1.2 million copyright infringement lawsuit against CBS Interactive.

The lawsuit alleges that CBS Interactive’s ZDNet China made the controversial Green Dam filtering software available for download on its Web site and that Green Dam included code copied from Solid Oak’s CYBERsitter program.

The Chinese government earlier this year said that all PCs sold in China would have to come with Green Dam installed by July 1.

The government claimed that the software was necessary to protect young people from unhealthy Internet content — mainly pornographic and violent material — but human rights groups reported that the software blocked political and religious content too.

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Post tags: copyright, Green Dam, Internet censorship
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When racing driver Han Han flipped the bird at judges after receiving a penalty during the China Touring Car Championship in June, many asked if he had taken his tendency for controversy a step too far.

But he followed up on his blog, lambasting the Federation of Automobile Sports as “unprofessional” in enforcing rules and criticizing it for failing to impose penalties for prohibited pre-rally road surveys.

Asked whether he considered the influence of his obscene gesture on society, Han responded with typical sarcasm: “The only group that might be affected is the children, but I believe that with the protection of ‘Green Dam’ (filtering software designed to block violence and pornographic content on the Internet), they won’t be hurt.”

It was the sort of hard-hitting criticism that has made the 27-year-old the most popular blogger in China — and seen him hailed as the voice of his generation.

More stories about Han Han on CDT. [CDT just noted that the Xinhua article above is the same article that ran in China Daily in August.]

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Post tags: bloggers, Green Dam, Han Han, Xinhua
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LAST THURSDAY, China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology announced its withdrawal of requirements that Green Dam Internet censorship software come pre-installed on all computers. This victory is not unblemished. China is continuing to install the software in computers at Internet cafes and universities. And some manufacturers continue to include it with computers shipped to the country. But the outcome — although not perfect — is a success for the Chinese people and the cause of Internet freedom.

The prevailing argument from Western companies that have been dealing with China has often been that of inevitability — if we don’t accept Chinese demands, someone else will. But the successful pushback against Green Dam by computer manufacturers and the State Department suggests another possibility: If everyone remains firm, we can achieve results.

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2009. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Green Dam, Internet control
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The decision is momentous and the government’s claim it was all a big misunderstanding is a step towards admitting that actually it just didn’t make Chinese citizens very happy. Li Yizhong, the minister for industry and information technology, made the concession. According to the Guardian report, “the notion that the Green Dam programme would be required on every new computer was ‘a misunderstanding’ spawned by poorly written regulation”. At least he recognises that sometimes the government is inconsiderate, especially when disseminating (and implementing) its guidelines. In the case of the Green Dam Youth Escort, the original regulations were certainly uncompromising.

The episode provides a minor victory for Chinese netizens, a guarantee that the government won’t lash out with forced implementation. It enables Chinese computer users to breathe a sigh of relief, and comes at a time when respite is most needed.

Unfortunately there have recently been many cases of netizen abuse but hopes have been raised because in several of these cases – like Green Dam – the government appears to have relented in the face of public opinion.

For its part, the China Daily issued their own op-ed about Green Dam, called, “Gift of Hindsight”:

Something meant to protect our young citizens from harmful information is worthy of applause. Yet the “Green Dam” was stonewalled because of the fear that it would compromise people’s privacy and right to know.

Now, Mr Li clarifies that we have all been mistaken about what was on their mind – they had no intention to monitor our online activities, nor did they want to impose the filtering device on all personal computers. Which is different from what we heard two months back. At the June 30 press conference we heard the ministry, for some reason, was only postponing forced installation of the software. And, sources in the ministry disclosed then that compulsory installation was only “a matter of time.”

And, now, Mr Li assures us that the so-called forced installation was the result of a misleading impression, which itself was the outcome of awkward representation.

It is a pity that a well-thought-out public interest initiative turned into a public relations disaster for the ministry. And it is all about misrepresentation. Never again should something like this be repeated.

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2009. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Green Dam, online activism, online public opinion
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