A LAWYER and activist who says she has been disabled by police abuse over the past decade lay on a bed as she went on trial in Beijing yesterday.
Ni Yulan (51) is the latest rights defender to come before the Chinese courts in the past week as part of a growing crackdown on dissent.
Ms Ni is charged with fraud and falsifying facts to steal property. She is also charged along with her husband, Dong Jiqin, with causing a disturbance at the Yuxingong Guesthouse where the couple had been detained by police.
Ms Ni and Mr Dong were picked up earlier this year during a dragnet aimed at preventing Arab Spring-style unrest taking hold in China.
According to Ms Ni and her supporters, the charges are trumped up and she and Mr Dong are being punished for their years of activism. She and her husband are well known for their advocacy for people who were forced out of their homes to make way for the renovation of Beijing before the 2008 Olympics.
Ms Ni and her supporters say that, because of repeated episodes of torture over the past decade, she cannot walk and suffers from a range of chronic conditions. While she was in prison, her house in one of the old neighbourhoods in Beijing was demolished and she and her husband lived on the streets until pressure from overseas forced authorities to allow them to move into the Yuxingong Guesthouse in the summer of 2010.
An editorial in the state-run Global Times newspaper said it was “necessary to decisively punish those who incite subversion of state power” to “safeguard national security”.
There is anxiety within the Beijing leadership over slowing economic growth and rising inflation. Such concerns have been compounded by violent protests in south China in recent weeks.
Against this background, China’s courts have been busy over the Christmas period.
Two of China’s most prominent human rights activists, Chen Wei and Chen Xi, both veterans of the 1989 pro-democracy movement, were sentenced to nine and 10 years in prison respectively for posting essays on the internet that were deemed subversive by the government.
Two weeks ago, more than a year and a half after civil rights lawyer Gao Zhisheng disappeared, the authorities said he would be jailed for three years for breaching the terms of his probation.
Tensions are running high in China ahead of a crucial year in which Chinese president Hu Jintao and premier Wen Jiabao will gradually hand over power to a new generation of leaders.