Speech delivered at the 8th “709 Human Rights Lawyers Award” ceremony at Amnesty UK in London on 3 July 2024
Patrick Poon
This year, we are giving this award to two amazing women. They studied law. They are brave.
Beijing lawyer Li Yuhan (李昱函), who is now in her 70s, represented human rights lawyer Wang Yu during the 709 crackdown. However, she herself was detained and later formally arrested by the police in Heping District in Shenyang, Liaoning province, in October 2017. What was she charged with? The infamous charge of “picking quarrels and provoking trouble”, a pocket crime often used by the Chinese authorities to crack down on dissidents. She was also later accused of “fraud”, also another loosely defined offence that the authorities would use against dissidents. After trial and sentencing were repeatedly delayed, she was detained for six years before she was eventually sentenced to six and a half years. She was finally released from prison on 24 March after enduring all these years of ordeal, including inhumane treatment in custody. She simply applied her legal knowledge to help others, but she herself became a victim of the ridiculous, irrational and illogical Chinese legal system. Lawyers became victims. This is what happens in authoritarian regimes. Barrister and Hong Kong activist Chow Hang-Tung, last year’s winner of the award and the subject of the documentary “She’s in Jail” that we will show here today, is another example of a legal professional being targeted by the authoritarian regime in Hong Kong. She has also been detained for several years and is still yet to know when she will be tried and sentenced. We can see the common features of authoritarian regimes.
Our second winner this year, Zhang Zhan (張展), also studied law. After the 709 crackdown, the Chinese authorities imposed stricter rules on lawyers signing statements and open letters to support various issues, imposing administrative penalties on lawyers who join these activities. Zhang Zhan signed a joint letter to oppose these rules. Her lawyer’s license was revoked. Zhang Zhan also supported the Hong Kong protests during the 2019 “Anti-Extradition Bill” movement. She was detained for two months. In February 2020, when the COVID pandemic started in Wuhan, Zhang Zhan went from Shanghai to Wuhan to witness and record the situation of lockdown, exposing the real situation on the ground that the official Chinese media would never cover. She became a victim of retaliation by the Chinese authorities. On 14 May 2020, Shanghai police went down all the way to Wuhan to take her back to Shanghai and arrest her, again with the pocket crime of “picking quarrels and provoking trouble”. She staged a long hunger strike in detention. Her deteriorating health condition was so worrying that attracted global attention. On 28 December 2020, she was sentenced to 4 years imprisonment. She continued her hunger strike in prison while enduring years of imprisonment. She was finally released on 13 May 2024. But she was immediately subjected to tight surveillance. After being able to meet with her friends, she was questioned and threatened by the Shanghai police on 9 June that she would be jailed again if she would cross the “red line” again.
Like many other human rights defenders in China, these two brave women just try to assist and speak up for other human rights victims. Yet, they themselves, despite with legal knowledge, intelligence and enthusiasm to help others, become victims. Their courage and perseverance deserve our utmost respect. They sacrificed their freedom to let the world know that there are indeed people in China who have legal knowledge and women who are in a male-dominated Chinese society are willing to risk their freedom and even their lives to speak up for others and expose human rights violations.
Let us congratulate and give a round of applause to our two winners this year – Li Yuhan and Zhang Zhan.
Thank you.
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Closing remarks
Thank you all for joining today’s event.
As we congratulate and celebrate the winners of this year’s 709 Human Rights Lawyers Award, we also heard several human rights lawyers and family members telling us that they still face oppression. As we have just seen the abridged version of the documentary on Hong Kong barrister and activist Chow Hang-Tung (the full version is 114 minutes), we still don’t know when Chow Hang-Tung, fellow leaders of the Hong Kong Alliance – human rights lawyer and prominent politician Albert Ho, trade union leader and prominent politician Lee Cheuk-Yan – and many other friends in China and Hong Kong are still detained simply because they uphold their and others’ human rights.
As we end our event today, let us not forget them and continue to raise their cases whenever and wherever possible.
Thank you.
