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China 'surpresses free speech'
20/05/2005 12:58 - (SA)
Beijing - A New York-based rights group on Friday blasted as a "gross injustice" a 10-year term meted out to a Chinese journalist for releasing information related to the 1989 Tiananmen massacre.
Shi Tao, 37, received his sentence late last month after a procedure that did not reflect well on the reign of President Hu Jintao, Human Rights in China said in a statement.
"Shi Taos case has raised widespread concern inside and outside of China as a classic example of the Hu Jintao regimes relentless suppression of free speech and free press," said Liu Qing, president of the group.
The group had obtained Shi Tao's appeal documents, saying they highlighted the "gross injustice" of this case.
Earlier reports said Shi was accused of leaking "state secrets" after he posted on the internet a central government gag order that forbade all Chinese media from marking the 15th anniversary of the June 1989 crackdown last year.
Officials accosted him on the street of his home town Taiyuan in north China's Shanxi province, hooded him and unlawfully transported him to the city of Changsha more than 1 000km
away, the group said.
The State Secrets Bureau and the Changsha Municipal Intermediate Peoples Court stated that Shis crime was transmitting crucial contents of a central government document to the overseas website Democracy Newsletter.
But in his appeal, Shi contends his notes recorded a newspaper executives description to journalists of guidelines issued by the provincial propaganda department regarding efforts to maintain social stability, the group said.
Among the guidelines were observations regarding the possibility of overseas democracy activists finding a way to re-enter China to carry out memorial activities for the Tiananmen anniversary, it said.
"Shi Tao argues that the information he provided to Democracy Newsletter related to public sentiment, which cannot be construed as a state secret," the group said.
China defines state secrets broadly, allowing the government to arrest anyone for revealing a wide spectrum of information it finds sensitive.
Hundreds, if not thousands, of people were killed when the Chinese military stormed the capital in 1989 - an incident that has remained taboo in the Chinese media ever since.
- AFP
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