Kiinalaiset rauhanomaiset aktivistit palautettu Thaimaasta Kiinaan. Kidutuksen vaara. Vaadi suojelua. Vastaa VETOAN AKTIVISTI NIMESI numeroon 16499. Viesti maksaa 90snt.
Chinese activists Jiang Yefei (left) and Dong Guangping are at grave risk of torture and other ill-treatment, as well as unfair trials in China after having been deported from Thailand by local authorities. They had been arrested by Thai authorities on 28 October 2015 for not having valid visas. Their families have not received official notice of their deportation, which took place between 12 and 16 November, and neither have their families been able to contact them since 5 November.
Both men had previously been detained in China for their peaceful activism. Jiang Yefei, was detained and tortured in China in May and August of 2008 after criticizing the official response to the 2008 earthquake in China’s Sichuan province. He fled to Thailand with his wife shortly after and in April 2015, was granted refugee status by the UNHCR.
Dong Guangping was detained by Chinese authorities from May 2014 to February 2015 after participating in an event commemorating victims of the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown. He arrived in Thailand with his wife and daughter in September this year to escape harassment. At the time of his arrest, he had a pending request for refugee status with UNHCR. This has since been approved.
For violating immigration laws and failing to pay fines related to this, Jiang Yefei and Dong Guangping were supposed to be held in a Bangkok prison until 20 November and 25 November respectively, during which the UNHCR could handle their resettlement to a third country that would ensure their protection. Unidentified individuals not known to either of the men or their families made unsolicited payments of the fines on 6 November. This led to the men being transferred immediately to the immigration detention centre and their deportation a few days later.
South East Asian countries are increasingly violating the non-refoulement principle following diplomatic pressure by China. A number of countries have forcibly returned dissidents and ethnic minorities fleeing China to authorities. On 8 July 2015, the Thai authorities returned to China some 100 individuals, mainly Uighurs who were at risk of torture and other cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment or punishment. In December 2012, Malaysia forcibly returned six Uighurs, whose claims for asylum were pending with the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR). In December 2009, the Cambodian authorities forcibly returned 20 ethnic Uighur asylum seekers. Of these 20, five are reported to have been sentenced to life imprisonment, while eight others are reported to have been sentenced to prison terms ranging from 16 to 20 year, after closed trials.
Amnesty International has also documented Chinese officials’ direct intervention to remove human rights defenders to China from South East Asian countries. On 6 October 2015, 16-year-old Bao Zhuoxuan, the son of Chinese lawyer Wang Yu, and Chinese activists Tang Zhishun and Xing Qingxian were taken away from a guesthouse in Mong La, a town in Myanmar close to the Chinese border, by uniformed officials and plain-clothed individuals. After several days during which there was no information about their whereabouts, Bao Zhuoxuan was returned to his grandparents’ home in Ulanhot, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, in northern China, where he is being held under house arrest. State media in China have denounced the actions of the two men travelling with him, and activists who are advocating for their release believe they are being held by Chinese authorities.