A Chinese court has begun the retrial of a blind Chinese legal expert after an appeals court overturned his controversial conviction for damaging property.
Chen Guangcheng was jailed in August for four years and three months on charges of damaging property and disrupting traffic during a protest in his home village in the eastern coastal province of Shandong in February.
But he and his family maintained the case was trumped up by vengeful local officials after he exposed forced late-term abortions and other family planning abuses.
"The damage done to China's image by Chen Guangcheng's imprisonment was too big," defence lawyer Xu Zhiyong, who was barred from defending Chen during the first trial, told Reuters.
In a rare move, the appeals court ordered a retrial after Mr Chen's lawyers were detained and accused of theft during the first trial, during which he was defended by stand-in lawyers who knew little about his case.
Self-taught in law and not licensed to practice, Mr Chen is known as a "barefoot lawyer".
Today's hearing began behind closed doors in Yinan County People's Court but one of Chen's lawyers was denied entry and was forced by police into a police van which drove away, said a lawyer's assistant.
Three of Chen's fellow villagers who had testified against him have since recanted and accused police of torturing or intimidating them during questioning, it has been reported.