China arrests cyber-lawyer

You'd think China had some sort of issue with free speech, from the way I kick up a stink every so often about their unique spin on human rights. Far be it from me to accuse the most populated nation on Earth of locking people up for going on the internet, but when you remove the ability of one of the few people in China to actually defend those accused of cyber-crimes, you kind of get the feeling that someone, somewhere, doesn't really want to see any of the sixty-three illegally held "criminals" outed from their cages.

(Spot the tabbed-browser friendly paragraph, folks!)

But in an amazing twist (in that it's amazing they didn't think of it sooner), the Chinese Government has decided if you can't beat 'em, lock up their laywers instead. Guo Guoting, one of the few individuals brave enough to actually attempt defending these people in court, had his office raided and his lawyer's licence seized as far back as the 23rd of Feburary - however, news of this has only started seeping into the West since the beginning of March.

Having defended Falun Gong practitioners in the past (probably not the safest of moves), the crunch came when he took up the case of journalist Shi Tao, who stands accused of divulging "state secrets" regarding the Tiananmen Square Massacre (though the exact nature of the secrets is open to debate, unless you assume it was along the lines of THEY RAN OVER THEIR OWN PEOPLE WITH TANKS!!!)

The Chinese Government saw their excuse and went for it, removing his licence and warning him that he faced a ban for up to a year with regards his legal practice. That's probably long enough to make the imprisoned individuals in question miraculously "disappear" down a hole somewhere, never to return. Not that I'm suggesting for one second that anyone in power in China would make someone vanish.

More ominously, this throws Guo Guoting's defence of two more cyber-dissidents into doubt - Zhang Lin and Huang Jinqiu, along with leaving Shi Tao facing the prospect of more of his favourite sport - breaking rocks. As more and more restrictions encroach upon the Chinese people online ("dubious" searches in Google are now often redirected to copycat Government sites with sanitised results), it's clear that any and all means are now being employed to silence any and all voices of reason in the East. Considering almost every single major problem China has faced since Mao was caused by a lack of information rather than a deluge, surely it's time the people in power saw sense and turned away from yet another self-destructive course of lunacy that can only end in defeat.

However...considering the fiasco that met some people wanting to see Guo Guoting's own hearing (for those that can't read Chinese, they were detained for five hours, pushed around, forcibly searched, had their phones stolen and sustained some cuts and bruises), that may be too much to wish for.