Human rights lawyer secretly tried in China

CHINA:One of China's most prominent human rights lawyers, Gao Zhisheng, was secretly put on trial in Beijing this week on charges of inciting subversion of state power, and faces three years in jail if convicted.

Mr Gao is an active member of the Christian community in the capital and has represented human rights defenders and people suffering persecution due to their political or religious beliefs. He has spoken to The Irish Timeson several occasions. His lawyers, Mo Shaoping and Ding Xikui, said they were excluded from proceedings and have not been allowed to visit him.

Mr Gao's secret trial can be seen as part of a nationwide crackdown on dissent in China and crusading lawyers are a primary target. The Chinese Communist Party is muzzling different voices ahead of a key congress in autumn 2007 and wants to stamp out potentially destabilising unrest - there were 87,000 "mass incidents" or civil disturbances in China last year.

In recent weeks the government has upheld convictions against Chen Guangcheng, the activist known as the "blind barefoot lawyer"; New York Times researcher Zhao Yan and Straits Times journalist Ching Cheong, all of whom human rights defenders believe have been wrongly convicted.

New York-based group Human Rights Watch said this week China should repeal restrictions on lawyers representing protesters in collective disputes and warned that the rules could worsen social unrest. After months of cat and mouse games with the authorities, Mr Gao was finally detained by Beijing police in August, one of a group of activists held in a crackdown.

He is a director of the Beijing-based Shengzhi Law Office - one of a small number of law firms that have taken on high-profile human rights cases. His office has had its licence suspended and he has had his own licence to practise revoked.

He and his wife, Geng He, have been harassed by the police for many months. Last year, Mr Gao wrote an open letter to President Hu Jintao and the premier, Wen Jiabao, calling for a government investigation into reports of systematic torture and persecution of Falun Gong practitioners.

In January he survived an assassination attempt when someone tried to kill him by knocking him down with a car.

Among those he defended are Cai Zhuohua, a pastor imprisoned for three years for "illegal business practices", including printing and selling the Bible.

Mr Gao was picked up briefly by the Beijing police earlier this year, after he noticed police officers filming him. He then filmed the police, which led to him being detained. A police officer told him at the time that killing him would be as easy as killing an ant.