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GAGGING THE LAWYERS: CHINA’S CRACKDOWN 

ON HUMAN RIGHTS LAWYERS AND IMPLICATIONS FOR U.S.-CHINA RELATIONS 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

CONGRESSIONAL-EXECUTIVE 

COMMISSION ON CHINA 

ONE HUNDRED FIFTEENTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

JUNE 28, 2017 

Printed for the use of the Congressional-Executive Commission on China 

( 

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.cecc.gov 

CONGRESSIONAL-EXECUTIVE COMMISSION ON CHINA 

LEGISLATIVE BRANCH COMMISSIONERS 

Senate House 

MARCO RUBIO, Florida, Chairman 

TOM COTTON, Arkansas 

STEVE DAINES, Montana 

JAMES LANKFORD, Oklahoma 

TODD YOUNG, Indiana 

DIANNE FEINSTEIN, California 

JEFF MERKLEY, Oregon 

GARY PETERS, Michigan 

ANGUS KING, Maine 

CHRIS SMITH, New Jersey, Cochairman 

ROBERT PITTENGER, North Carolina 

TRENT FRANKS, Arizona 

RANDY HULTGREN, Illinois 

MARCY KAPTUR, Ohio 

TIM WALZ, Minnesota 

TED LIEU, California 

EXECUTIVE BRANCH COMMISSIONERS 

Not yet appointed 

ELYSE B. ANDERSON, Staff Director 

PAUL B. PROTIC, Deputy Staff Director 

(II) 

(III) 

CO N T E N T S 

STATEMENTS

Page 

Opening Statement of Hon. Christopher Smith, a U.S. Representative From 

New Jersey; Cochairman, Congressional-Executive Commission on China .... 1 

Statement of Hon. Marco Rubio, a U.S. Senator From Florida; Chairman, 

Congressional-Executive Commission on China ................................................ 4 

Halliday, Terence, Co-Director, Center on Law and Globalization, American 

Bar Foundation and Coauthor of Criminal Defense In China: The Politics 

Of Lawyers At Work ............................................................................................ 6 

Teng Biao, Chinese Human Rights Lawyer, Visiting Scholar, Institute for 

Advanced Study and Co-Founder, Open Constitution Initiative and China 

Human Rights Accountability Center ................................................................ 9 

Xia Chongyu, Son of Imprisoned Human Rights Lawyer Xia Lin and a Student at Liberty University ................................................................................... 12 

Xiaorong Li, Co-editor, Charter 08, a Collection of Essays by Charter 08 

Signers and Supporters; Author, Ethics, Human Rights and Culture; 

Founder, Several Human Rights NGOs Focusing on China; and Occasional 

Contributor to Philosophy Journals and Newspapers ....................................... 13 

APPENDIX 

PREPARED STATEMENTS

Halliday, Terence ..................................................................................................... 28 

Teng, Biao ................................................................................................................ 29 

Xia, Chongyu ............................................................................................................ 33 

Li, Xiaorong .............................................................................................................. 39 

Rubio, Hon. Marco, a U.S. Senator From Florida; Chairman, CongressionalExecutive Commission on China ........................................................................ 42 

Smith, Hon. Christopher, a U.S. Representative From New Jersey; Cochairman, Congressional-Executive Commission on China ...................................... 43 

SUBMISSIONS FOR THE RECORD

Prominent Lawyer Cases ........................................................................................ 45 

Witness Biographies ................................................................................................ 51 

(1) 

GAGGING THE LAWYERS: CHINA’S CRACKDOWN ON HUMAN RIGHTS LAWYERS AND 

IMPLICATIONS FOR U.S.-CHINA RELATIONS 

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 28, 2017 

CONGRESSIONAL-EXECUTIVE

COMMISSION ON CHINA, 

Washington, DC. 

The hearing was convened, pursuant to notice, at 2:24 p.m., in 

room HVC–210, Capitol Visitor Center, Hon. Christopher Smith, 

Cochairman, presiding. 

Also Present: Chairman Rubio and Senator Young. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. CHRISTOPHER SMITH, A U.S. 

REPRESENTATIVE FROM NEW JERSEY; COCHAIRMAN, CONGRESSIONAL-EXECUTIVE COMMISSION ON CHINA 

Representative SMITH. Good afternoon. The hearing will come to 

order. And I want to thank each and every one of you for being 

here today. Sorry for the delay, both houses are in very active 

mode. 

We just had a series of votes. And I know Chairman Rubio is 

very much engaged on the healthcare issue, but he will be here 

very shortly. 

Chinese officials repeatedly tell me that I should focus more on 

the positive aspects of China and not dwell so much on the negative. I have heard it from diplomats, I have heard it from people 

when I have traveled in China Beijing as well as in Shanghai. 

That is an extremely difficult task when you read the horrifying 

and sadistic accounts of torture and enforced disappearances experienced by lawyers and rights advocates. It is hard to be positive 

when you contemplate Liu Xiaobo’s cancer diagnosis and the fact 

that China effectively silenced its most brilliant democracy advocate. 

Earlier today, I am happy to say, again, another voice from the 

administration at a hearing before the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, in answer to a question that I posed, Nikki Haley 

clearly and unmistakably said he should be free to go wherever he 

wants to go and that would include he and his wife coming to the 

United States to get the very necessary medical treatment that he 

has been denied. 

The empty chair at Oslo, and I was there, speaks volumes about 

the Communist Party’s abiding fear that freedom will upend the 

power of the privileged few when they should be seeing liberty as 

a path to a greater peace and prosperity. 

2 

At a hearing last month in the Subcommittee on Global Human 

Rights in the House Foreign Affairs Committee, I and my fellow 

colleagues heard testimony from the wives of five detained or disappeared human rights lawyers. The courageous women have become effective advocates for their husbands and for all those detained in the 709 crackdown. 

They described in horrifying detail the physical, mental, and psychological torture experienced by their husbands, including marathon interrogation sessions, sleep deprivation, beatings, crippling 

leg tortures and prolong submersion in water. 

Many of their husbands were also forced to take alarming quantities of drugs, including tranquilizers, barbiturates, antipsychotic 

drugs and other unknown substances daily. 

What they described was shocking, offensive and morally inhumane but, frankly, not surprising. It is also possible that Chinese 

officials believe the international community will not hold them accountable. 

After the hearing, I wrote the heads of the American Medical Association, the American Psychological Association, the World 

Health Organization, as well as Secretary of State Tillerson and 

Ambassador Nikki Haley. 

I asked for a condemnation of the practice of torture and medical 

experimentation on prisoners of conscience. 

I have also asked for investigations so that serious questions will 

be asked of the Chinese Government. We know that those questions have been asked in the past by many, including special 

rapporteurs for torture. I remember when Manfred Nowak made 

his trip to China, the report was scathing, and yet nothing has 

been done to ameliorate this horrific abuse. 

Finally, I have asked for accountability. I have asked Secretary 

Tillerson to start investigations under the Global Magnitsky Act, a 

bill that I led on the House side last year, so that any Chinese Government officials complicit in torture should be never allowed to 

benefit from entry to the United States or access to our financial 

system. 

The issues of torture and residential surveillance in a designated 

location, effectively enforced disappearances, will be priorities of 

mine and so many others, and the chairman, our good friend, 

Marco Rubio, as this Commission moves forward. 

I believe these issues are diverse and multi-level coalitions could 

be built to raise issues with the Chinese Government. 

I would also think we need to do more to prioritize the protection 

of human rights lawyers and their families. 

At the hearing last month, I heard the phrase ‘‘the war on law’’ 

used to describe the systematic effort to eviscerate the network of 

human rights lawyers. That phrase struck me because, though the 

number of human rights lawyers in China is small, what they 

stand for was nothing less than the rule of law for everyone, particularly those persecuted or aggrieved by the Communist Party. 

They stand for the right of everyone in China, religious believers, 

ethnic minorities, petitioners, women who have been forced to undergo forced abortions, labor activists, or victims of corrupt or of 

the barbaric population-control policies, to always have a fair hearing, due process and a justice that is not politicized. 

3 

We all remember the case of Chen Guangcheng who fought so 

hard for the women in Linyi who were being forced into abortions 

and forced sterilizations. And for that, he was brutalized, as well 

as his wife. 

And, of course, the Communist Party see the idea of fair hearings, due process and justice as not politicized, as a dangerous idea. 

It means that they should be accountable to the people—imagine 

that—to hundreds of millions of people, in fact, seeking redress for 

persecution and party corruption. 

Xi Jinping is feted in Davos for his commitments to openness and 

the rule of law, but it is rule of law for the few and the privileged 

and rule by law for the rest. 

The failure to implement the rule of law to favor a type of lawlessness in the pursuit of keeping the Communist Party in power 

has serious and lasting implications for U.S.-China relations as 

well. 

We must recognize, after the failure of two-and-a-half decades of 

the so-called engagement policies, that China’s domestic repression 

drives its external aggression, its mercantilist trade policies and its 

unimaginable decisions to keep propping up a murderous North 

Korean regime. 

I know the Chinese Government wants me and others to focus 

on positive things. I think one positive development here is that 

the spouses and families of rights advocates and lawyers have 

given Beijing a rightly deserved headache. They have refused, absolutely refused to be silent about their spouses’ detentions or disappearances and have used the internet and media to get out their 

message. 

This trend is something new, something different, something we 

need to honor and deeply respect because they are under great 

pressure to be silent through intimidation, harassment, threats and 

detention. 

I want to say to our witness, Chongyu, that we appreciate your 

testimony here today and the fact that you are speaking out on behalf of your father. We know that this Commission is an advocate 

for you and your entire family. If you or your family face reprisals 

because of your testimony here today, the Congress will take it as 

a personal affront to the work of this body. 

I know your petition has gathered 94,000 signatures. Please 

make sure that my name is 94,001. 

The one thing that gives me hope is that the people of China long 

for liberty, justice and opportunity. We saw it in the hearts and 

minds of those who braved the tanks, including Tank Man, during 

Tiananmen Square, possibilities that turned into a terrible, terrible 

tragedy and slaughter. But it was the heart of the Chinese people 

that came through. They want freedom. They want democracy. 

They want respect for fundamental human rights. 

The need for principled and consistent American leadership is 

now more important than ever as China’s growing economic power 

and persistent diplomatic efforts have succeeded in dampening 

global criticism of its escalating repression and failures to adhere 

to universal standards. 

The United States must be a beacon of liberty and a champion 

of individual rights and freedoms. The United States must also 

4 

continue to be a voice for those silenced, jailed or repressed in 

China. 

We cannot and will not forget those in China who bravely are 

seeking liberty and justice and the inalienable rights that we all 

share here in the United States. 

Like China’s human rights lawyers, like Liu Xiaobo, those who 

bravely seek peaceful change in China, that is our focus, that is our 

priority and that is our hopes and prayers are for them. 

I would like to now turn it over to the distinguished chairman, 

Senator Rubio. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. MARCO RUBIO, A U.S. SENATOR FROM FLORIDA; CHAIRMAN, CONGRESSIONAL-EXECUTIVE COMMISSION ON CHINA 

Chairman RUBIO. Well, thank you very much. Thank you for filling in. As you know, the Senate is involved in one big issue, the 

healthcare issue, and it delayed us here a little bit while we were 

involved in a conversation. So I thank you for starting it and for 

taking over and all of you for being here this afternoon. 

This hearing is entitled ‘‘Gagging the Lawyers: China’s Crackdown on Human Rights Lawyers and Its Implications for U.S.- 

China Relations.’’ 

We will only have one panel testify today. It is going to feature 

Terence Halliday who is the co-director of the Center on Law and 

Globalization at the American Bar Foundation and also the co-author of the book Criminal Defense in China: The Politics of Lawyer 

at Work; Teng Biao, a Chinese human rights lawyer, a visiting 

scholar at the Institute for Advanced Studies and co-founded of the 

Open Constitution Initiative and China Human Rights Accountability Center; Xia Chongyu, son of imprisoned human rights lawyer Xia Lin and a student at Liberty University; and Xiaorong Li 

who is an independent scholar formerly with the Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy at the University of Maryland. 

We thank you all for being here. 

Before we move to the topic at hand, I want to take a moment 

to acknowledge the news this week regarding the reported transfer 

of 2010 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Liu Xiaobo from prison to a 

hospital for treatment for late-stage liver cancer. This should not 

be confused with an act of mercy on the part of the Chinese Government. 

His eight years of imprisonment due to his eloquent appeals for 

nonviolent political reform and protection of human rights remains 

a travesty of justice and a stain on China’s human rights record. 

Dr. Liu’s medical parole is not the equivalent of an early release 

from his prison sentence or that he has the freedom to meet with 

his wife, Liu Xia, and other family members and friends. 

I have urged the President to seek a humanitarian transfer of 

Dr. Liu and his wife to the United States to explore what medical 

options may be available. 

I would also like to briefly read a quote from an editorial that 

ran in the Communist Party-controlled Global Times. The writer 

gloated, ‘‘China has not collapsed as the West forecast in the 1980s 

and 1990s, but has created a global economic miracle. A group of 

pro-democracy activists and dissidents lost a bet and ruined their 

5 

lives. Although Liu was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, he is likely 

to face tragedy in the end.’’ 

What a grotesque expression in this Communist Party-controlled 

publication. 

Any notion that Dr. Liu will receive adequate medical care under 

the supervision of his captors is simply absurd. I was pleased to 

read this morning that the newly arrived U.S. Ambassador Terry 

Branstad has urged the Chinese Government to allow Dr. Liu to 

seek treatment overseas. 

As the Nobel Committee noted, Dr. Liu exemplifies the long and 

nonviolent struggle for human rights in China. That same spirit 

animates the work of the Chinese rights lawyers you will hear 

about today. 

July 9th, 2017 marks the two-year anniversary of the start of 

what has been described as an unprecedented nationwide crackdown on human rights lawyers and legal advocates in China, an 

event that has come to be known as the 709 crackdown. 

While perhaps unprecedented in scale and coordination, nearly 

300 rights advocates were detained, summoned for questioning or 

disappeared, the crackdown began much earlier. 

Xi Jinping’s rule has been marked by extensive campaigns to silence political dissent, curtail civil society and ensure ideological 

loyalty to and conformity with the Chinese Communist Party. No 

sector of society is untouched. Business leaders, bloggers, social 

media users, university professors, journalists, religious adherents 

have all been targeted, but China’s rights defenders and lawyers 

have been the tip of the spear for even longer, as our second witness, Dr. Teng Biao, can no doubt attest. 

This small, but tenacious group is closely linked to the growth 

in legal rights consciousness among ordinary Chinese citizens. China’s rights defense movement converged around the incidents of injustice that resulted from the single-minded drive of the Chinese 

Government and the Communist Party for rapid economic growth 

without political reform. 

The victims of injustice included farmers who lost land from government expropriation, urban residents forcibly evicted without fair 

compensation, migrant workers trying to recoup unpaid wages, 

teachers, laid-off workers and army veterans who lost their pensions, and parents whose children were made ill from ingesting 

contaminated milk powder. The movement has expanded to support free speech, the pro-democracy aspirations of Hong Kongers, 

ethnic minority rights and other issues. 

Our first witness, Dr. Halliday, has conducted literally hundreds 

of interviews with these men and women, a group bound together 

by their shared conviction regarding the importance of protecting 

basic legal freedoms a system where rule of law remains aspirational at best. 

Among the lawyers featured in his latest book are those whose 

names and stories have captured headlines for the last two years. 

Their unjust and unexpected detentions nearly two years ago was, 

for many, the start of a long and harrowing ordeal marked by 

months in isolation, torture, coerced confessions and other forms of 

mistreatment. 

6 

Some of these lawyers, like Jiang Tianyong, whose wife I had the 

privilege of meeting earlier this year, remain in detention. Others, 

like Li Heping, are no longer in captivity, but the brutality they experienced left them visibly, physically altered. Many have been disbarred and will never practice law in China again. And still others 

live under constant surveillance and harassment. 

It is tempting in the face of China’s worsening and increasingly 

brazen human rights violations to grow disheartened, which is why 

I think it is equally important to spend some time today examining 

another part of this crackdown that is unprecedented, and that is 

the response of some of the family members of those detained. By 

their own telling, many of the wives of these rights lawyers had not 

previously been involved in their husbands’ efforts to pursue justice 

and accountability from their government, but as the present system conspired against them and their families, they became advocates in their own right. 

In case after case, these women took up the mantle of advocacy 

on behalf of their husbands. Their personal accounts of intimidation and harassment, of landlords refusing them housing, of children denied entry into local schools, of movement restricted and 

lives lived under constant surveillance, coupled with their compelling public defense of their husbands’ innocence has, in the words 

of Dr. Halliday, opened up a, quote, ‘‘new line of struggle that we 

have not seen before in China,’’ end quote. 

Similar courage and boldness is on display today with the testimony of Xia Chongyu about his father’s plight. Even for those of 

us who hold steadfastly to the view that the United States foreign 

policy must be infused with the principled defense of human rights 

and the promotion of basic freedoms, there remains a notion that 

change in China will ultimately come from within. And I agree. 

And China’s rights defense lawyers are at the vanguard in pressing for systematic change and seeking accountability and redress 

and working toward a day when China is a nation where the law 

is used to protect rights, not to suppress them. It is our duty to 

stand with them in this monumental task. 

And it is our honor to welcome all of you here today. 

And we will begin with the testimony of Mr. Halliday. 

Thank you for being here. 

STATEMENT OF TERENCE HALLIDAY, CO-DIRECTOR, CENTER 

ON LAW AND GLOBALIZATION, AMERICAN BAR FOUNDATION 

AND COAUTHOR, CRIMINAL DEFENSE IN CHINA: THE POLITICS OF LAWYERS AT WORK 

Mr. HALLIDAY. Mr. Chairman, Mr. Cochairman and distinguished members of the Commission, I am privileged to be invited 

here to participate in this hearing. 

I have a longstanding admiration for the work of the Commission. 

In my opening remarks, I address the meaning and the significance of China’s unprecedented crackdown on lawyers almost two 

years after its onset in early 2015. My comments are derived from 

the empirical research of my research team into criminal procedure 

law and criminal defense lawyers over the past 12 years. 

7 

Our findings, published in our book Criminal Defense in China, 

conclude that China’s legal system and China’s legal profession 

have come an enormous distance since the enactment of the 1979 

Criminal Procedure Law. 

Nevertheless, on a number of issues integral to the defense of 

basic legal freedoms, China has turned away from reform both in 

its law and in its treatment of a key segment of the legal profession. 

A sudden turning point occurred on July 9, 2015, when China 

launched a nationwide crackdown on activist lawyers. The 709 

crackdown, as it has been colloquially labeled, has been unprecedented in scale and severity. 

Within days, hundreds of lawyers across China were detained, 

disappeared and interrogated. Lawyers have been intimidated, tortured, charged with serious crimes and sanctioned severely. 

Why did this crackdown occur? Research on activist lawyers reveals deep grievances held by hundreds of millions of Chinese who 

suffer from health-threatening pollution, from takings of their 

homes and land, from widening inequality, from religious controls 

and persecution, from discriminatory treatment of minorities, from 

inadequate protection of workers and women, and from exploitation 

and vulnerability of migrant laborers, among others. 

The sheer quantity of disaffected and angry populations can fuel 

widespread social unrest. Lawyers often become the help of last resort when every other channel has failed. Therefore, over the past 

several years the Chinese Communist Party has faced a double 

threat to its survival. On the one hand, economic and social problems appear to be multiplying and intensifying. On the other hand, 

lawyers increasingly have been articulating and expressing those 

grievances through law in highly visible ways. 

What triggered the crackdown on lawyers on July 9, 2015? Over 

the last several years, activist lawyers significantly increased in 

numbers. Hundreds of new activists, many of them young and welleducated, signaled their willingness to join the front line. 

Lawyers magnified their ability to mobilize. 

Since 2011, lawyers increasingly came together in large defense 

teams in difficult trials. Through social media, activist lawyers 

could create instant crowds to rush to a courthouse or defend a 

lawyer being harassed by police. Nationwide, online networks could 

mobilize hundreds of lawyers for new cases or emergency situations. 

The power of social media multiplied the impact of a new type 

of lawyer. So-called diehard lawyers actively used the social media 

and street theater to activate supporters and expose problems in 

defending their clients. 

Some lawyers had accumulated thousands or even millions of followers on Weibo, China’s equivalent to Twitter. Clearly, China’s 

leaders felt vulnerable to activist, diehard and ordinary lawyers’ 

enhanced powers to mobilize publics. 

What motivates these lawyers to exhibit such courage in the face 

of a regime that does not hesitate to use inhumane and even lifethreatening measures against its opponents? 

Our research reveals that courage for many lawyers arises from 

their own life experiences, such as harms to parents during the 

8 

Cultural Revolution, participation in the 1989 Tiananmen movement, or shocking experiences in their legal practices. 

Many lawyers build their courageous representation upon legal 

ideals that underwrite the good political society. 

First, they insist on the protection of basic legal freedoms, such 

as the right to be represented by a lawyer, due process in trials 

and fair adjudication. They insist upon freedoms of speech, of association and religion. 

Second, they are committed to a vibrant civil society as it is expressed through voluntary associations and an open public sphere. 

Third, these activist lawyers strongly oppose arbitrary executive 

power, and they call for checks and balances within the state. 

Our research documents that many lawyers, notable and ordinary practitioners, also draw their courage from their Christian 

faith. Christian lawyers insist upon the value of equality. Most importantly, that in the eyes of God and in the eyes of the law, said 

one lawyer, ‘‘Chairman Mao is as equal as me.’’ 

They champion the Judeo-Christian emphasis on a political and 

legal order that delivers justice, often quoting, like Martin Luther 

King, the Biblical prophets Amos and Micah. 

They believe in fairness, that justice should be available reliably 

and fairly to all, whether they are Han Chinese or Tibetan, Party 

members or Falun Gong members. 

Finally, they hold China’s law accountable to God’s law. I consider it probable that Party leaders fear Christian lawyer leaders 

who have strong relationships with Protestant churches across 

China, China’s largest civil society group, and some who have significant international connections. 

What does the lawyer crackdown tell the world and us about 

China’s future? Viewing China through the lens of courageous lawyers reveals that legal change in China has turned toward repression, a repression which has taken deeply sobering turns since 

2015. 

Nevertheless, deep impetuses for change remain within China. 

Repressive actions themselves may be self-subversive. Notable activists refuse to surrender easily or to go quietly. Their wives, their 

comrades spring to their defense. Significant numbers of grassroots 

lawyers continue to harbor visions of alternative legal political futures. The international community ratchets up its efforts at solidarity, pressure, and support for lawyers. Where goes China may 

depend very considerably on where go its lawyers. Will it follow 

long, peaceful paths of reform and the expansion of basic legal freedoms that are offered by these activist lawyers? Or will China 

lurch toward a violent, explosive path that could lead to fearful, 

unpredictable outcomes? 

For the United States to respond vigorously to China’s repression 

against lawyers and its deviance with respect to global norms, may 

I offer the following recommendations. 

(1) The United States Government and the international community of states, international organizations, and publics should stand 

in solidarity with China’s activist lawyers and hold China’s practices strictly accountable to global standards, most importantly 

those inscribed in U.N. conventions, principles, and institutions. 

9 

These are applicable to all persons, places, and states without exception. 

(2) The United States Government should maintain its leadership position in the United Nations Human Rights Council and 

other authoritative international bodies so that China does not 

erode or dilute universal norms of law, lawyers, and rights. 

(3) The United States Government should use all means at its 

dispoal, including joint statements with other states, bilateral dialogues, and monitoring by U.S. agencies to press China to adhere 

to global standards in its treatment of all its lawyers, most especially those swept up in the crackdown. 

(4) The current administration should strengthen the capacity of 

the U.S. Department of State and other executive agencies to monitor treatment of vulnerable populations in China and particularly 

lawyers who represent those populations. 

(5) U.S. Government agencies, including the CECC, should mobilize U.S. firms businesses operating in China to recognize the dangers their employees and partners face as China offers less and less 

protections to persons inside China who cross invisible lines being 

drawn and redrawn by China’s security apparatus. 

(6) The United States should lead other states in the call for release of activists being punished for their rights defense work, and 

reject the criminalization of their legitimate exercise of rights protected by Chinese and international law. 

Chairman RUBIO. Thank you. 

We will recognize our second witness, Teng Biao. 

STATEMENT OF TENG BIAO, CHINESE HUMAN RIGHTS LAWYER, VISITING SCHOLAR, INSTITUTE FOR ADVANCED STUDY, 

AND CO-FOUNDER, THE OPEN CONSTITUTION INITIATIVE 

AND CHINA HUMAN RIGHTS ACCOUNTABILITY CENTER 

Mr. BIAO. Mr. Chairman, distinguished members of CECC, I am 

honored to be invited to testify at this especially important hearing. 

This coming July 9th, the second anniversary of the 709 crackdown, there will be events in DC., Hong Kong, Taiwan and some 

European cities to mark the inaugural China Human Rights Lawyers’ Day, which I have been organizing for months. 

Chinese human rights lawyers have since 2003 become one of the 

most active and effective forces in China defending rights and freedom and, inevitably, have been the target of the government’s persecution since the beginning of the rights defense movement. 

Because of my work of promoting human rights and democracy 

since 2003, I was disbarred, banned from teaching and eventually 

fired, banned from travelling, and kidnapped for three times by the 

secret police. 

In 2011, I was detained in a black jail for 70 days in an extreme 

form of solitary confinement, physically and mentally tortured. My 

wife and daughter were banned from travelling abroad, and my 

wife fired by the company she worked for due to the pressure from 

Chinese Government. 

Collective punishment is frequently used by Chinese authorities 

to maximize intimidation. The purpose of torture and collective 

punishment was to make me stop my human rights work, but I did 

not. 

10 

The persecution of rights lawyers reached its peak in 709 crackdown. Eight lawyers are still in prison, including Jiang Tianyong 

and—Wu Gan. Wang Quanzhang has disappeared since July 2015. 

His family and lawyers do not even know whether he is alive or 

dead. 

Dozens of lawyers were severely tortured, including beatings, 

electric shocks, sleep deprivation, death threats, months or years of 

solitary confinement, so on and so on. 

Notably, it has been confirmed that many lawyers and activists 

were force-fed with medicines which caused them muscle pain, 

blurred vision and other physical and mental harm. 

The prison conditions and the treatment in detentions are extremely inhuman and cruel in China. As we know, deliberate neglect aggravated Liu Xiaobo’s cancer. 

Now, both Liu Xiaobo and Liu Xia clearly expressed that they 

want to go out of China. 

The rights defense movement has emerged since early 2000 as a 

new focus of the Chinese democracy movement, up to the Xidan democracy wall movement in late 1970s and the Tiananmen democratic moment in 1989. 

Let us take a brief look at the history of the Chinese Communist 

Party. When the Communist Party was facing a deep legal and economical crisis in the late 1970s after waves of political campaigns 

and the brutal Cultural Revolution, they had to introduce a process 

of legalization and marketization. 

Legalization was necessary for establishing social order and market economy, and thus was beneficial to the political system when 

mass mobilization was not applicable anymore. 

Millions of laws and regulations were made, legal professions 

were recovered, by the CCP never meant to accept a democratic 

transition or rule of law. Opposition of politics is prohibited, but we 

lawyers and rights advocates tried our best to use existing legal 

channels to defend human rights and freedom. 

Starting with a narrow space, the rights defense movement attracted more and more supporters, such as lawyers, bloggers, persecuted religious groups, victims of human rights abuse, and political dissidents. There are incredible achievements under such a repressive regime. 

For the past 14 years, the development of the rights defense 

movement was expressed through at least four trends, namely, organization, street activism, politicization and internationalization. 

There is a clear limitation to China’s legalization, that is oneparty rule, the number-one priority of the CCP. Once the CCP 

senses the use of law could be a potential challenge, it never hesitates to nip it in the bud. 

When Xi Jinping took his office, what the CCP was facing was 

increasing crisis, political, economical, social and ideological crisis. 

The calculation of Xi Jinping is that without a war on law to destroy the resisting ability of the social and political movement, a 

color revolution will occur, and thus, the monopoly of power of the 

Communist Party will be in danger. This is the political background of 709 crackdown. 

Once again, the CCP’s war on law makes it urgent and necessary 

to change U.S. human rights policy toward China. 

11 

In 1989, all democracies condemned the Tiananmen massacre, 

sanctioned Chinese dictators and supported Tiananmen activists in 

jail or in exile. Yet very soon, Western leaders could not wait to 

welcome Chinese butchers and dictators, rolling out their red carpet replete with eager hugs and state banquets. 

In 1994, U.S. Government granted permanent most-favored-nation status to China to delink human rights to trade, despite protests from human rights groups. Then China was allowed to enter 

the WTO and international market. 

China was given the opportunity to host Olympics, World Expo, 

APEC and the G20. China was voted in as a member of United Nations Human Rights Council again and again. 

Now China has become the second-largest economy and is playing an active and aggressive role on the international stage. 

Cyberattacks, South China Sea aggression, abducting overseas 

booksellers and activists, Confucius Institutes which erode academic freedom, the list goes on. 

China is demanding a rewrite of international norms, wanting to 

create a new international order in which rule of law is manipulated, human dignity is debased, democracy is abused, and justice 

is denied. In this international order, corruption and persecution 

are ignored, perpetrators are immune and dictatorial regimes are 

united and smugly complacent. 

I would like to point out that U.S. human rights policy toward 

China has long been based on a series of erroneous theories and 

mistaken presumptions regarding Chinese politics and their society. 

I do not have time to go into details, but the erroneous theories 

cover misunderstandings of China’s market, constitution, international accountability, NGOs, so on and so on. 

Finally, I would like to offer a few recommendations here. 

Link human rights to trade and other important issues that the 

CCP cares about. 

Implement the Global Magnitsky Act to ban Chinese perpetrators and corrupt officials from entering the United States. 

Punish U.S. and Western businesses which cooperate with Chinese authorities and participate in human rights abuses. 

End the 110 Confucius Institutes in the United States educational institutions. 

Do not fund the oppressor. 

Support the real NGOs, not GONGOs. 

Name and shame. 

Expel China from the Human Rights Council of the United Nations. 

A powerful and autocratic China will bring calamities to mankind. Supporting democracy and human rights in China not only 

corresponds to American-declared values, it will also benefit American politics, society and economics in the long term. 

Please stand on the side of Chinese people, not on the side of 

Chinese Communist Party. China should be represented by the 

human rights lawyers, activists, dissidents and all Chinese people 

fighting for freedom and democracy, not the illegitimate party and 

the government. 

Thank you. 

12 

Chairman RUBIO. Thank you so much for your testimony. 

Our third witness is Xia Chongyu. He is the son of a prominent 

imprisoned human rights lawyer, Xia Lin. He is currently a college 

student at Liberty University, but his mother still lives in China. 

And it is in our view, let me just say this, it is incredibly important that we make clear that his appearance here today should not 

in any way lead to any pressure on him or harm on him or his family. If such an event exists and happens, we will view it as a direct 

attack by Chinese Government and Communist Party officials as a 

result of your testimony here today. 

And it is something I want to make abundantly clear, that it is 

something we will be watching and strongly condemning and pointing to and knowing that it is directly related to your appearance 

here today. So it is our hope that that is not the case. 

But we thank you for being here. 

STATEMENT OF XIA CHONGYU, SON OF IMPRISONED HUMAN 

RIGHTS LAWYER XIA LIN AND A STUDENT AT LIBERTY UNIVERSITY 

Mr. XIA. Dear Congressmen and Congressmen, respectful audience, I am Xia Chongyu, son of Chinese human rights lawyer Xia 

Lin. 

It is such a great honor to be here to share about my father’s situation and what my family has been through these past years. 

My father dedicates himself to be the voice for the voiceless and 

provides pro bono legal assistance to the victims of human rights 

violation cases. 

On November 8th, 2014 my father was abducted by secret agents 

without a warrant. The government did not inform my mother of 

my father’s arrest until five days after the fact and denied my father’s basic rights to meet with his defense attorney for three or 

four months. 

Meanwhile, the police kept asking my father about the politically 

sensitive cases he represented. My father was physically and mentally tortured by the police, who used interrogation techniques such 

as shining a strong light on his eyes to keep him awake for days. 

They tried to break him so that he would confess to fraud, but all 

their attempts failed. 

After 600 days of imprisonment, he was unfairly tried in a 

closed-door hearing. My father was denied a personal statement in 

court and none of the witnesses had a chance to testify. 

The Second Court of Beijing sentenced my father to 12 years in 

prison for fraud, without appropriate evidence. My father’s final 

sentence was delivered without a fair second trial in February 

2014. No one ever accused my father in person. 

I refuse to accept this illegal and unjust verdict. In April, I presented my petition at a convocation of Liberty University and the 

responses were overwhelming. However, when I tried to deliver my 

petition with over 14,000 signatures to the Chinese embassy, no 

one would even see me. Before I left, I read my petition aloud at 

the gate of the embassy. 

At this moment, I have collected over 94,000 signatures. Most of 

them come from Americans and the rest are from other countries 

around the world. I am not alone. 

13 

As a rising nation, China’s deteriorating human rights record is 

unacceptable. When a human rights lawyer cannot secure his own 

fundamental rights, I believe every member’s rights in the society 

are threatened. 

Human rights lawyers are the cornerstone of society. I hope the 

U.S. Government can increase its involvement in such cases in the 

future. Moreover, I wish the Congress of America could urge the 

Chinese Government to stop controlling the judiciary system and 

stop the persecution against 709 lawyers. 

Lastly, I plead that the White House summon the Chinese ambassador and ask the Chinese Government to respond to me and 

my 94,000 petition supporters. 

Meanwhile, I recommend the White House or State Department 

issue a clear policy regretting this type of case. By making a clear 

stance, the U.S. Government would communicate to the world that 

human rights violations will not be tolerated. 

I appreciate the Congress for organizing this hearing so that our 

voice could be heard by the world. 

Thank you. 

Chairman RUBIO. And we thank you for your testimony here 

today. 

We are going to begin our questions and I am going to turn it 

first over—oh, I apologize. I am so sorry. I am so sorry. I apologize. 

So our final testimony—I said ‘‘final’’ earlier and that is what 

threw me off. There is a seat missing, that is what threw me off, 

in between the both of you. 

Xiaorong Li is an independent scholar, formerly with the Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy at the University of Maryland. 

And thank you for being here. And we are ready for your testimony. 

The microphone, if you could just push the button. Could you tell 

them to push the button for her, please? Thank you. There we go. 

STATEMENT OF XIAORONG LI, CO-EDITOR OF CHARTER 08, A 

COLLECTION OF ESSAYS BY CHARTER 08 SIGNERS AND SUPPORTERS, AUTHOR OF ETHICS, HUMAN RIGHTS AND CULTURE, FOUNDER OF SEVERAL HUMAN RIGHTS NGOS FOCUSING ON CHINA, AND OCCASIONAL CONTRIBUTOR TO PHILOSOPHY JOURNALS AND NEWSPAPERS 

Ms. LI. Thank you, CECC Commissioners and staff. I am asked 

to share a few thoughts about how Congress and the U.S. Government should respond to the July 9 crackdown on lawyers and the 

overall worsening human rights situation in China, which, under 

President Xi Jinping, has taken a nose-down dive. 

Two days ago, many of us woke up with the heart wrenching 

news that Liu Xiaobo, the Nobel Peace Prize laureate, was diagnosed with terminal liver cancer, was granted ‘‘medical parole’’ and 

relocated from prison to a hospital. Except a brief video call, his 

wife Liu Xia has not been able to talk freely. It is now clear that 

Liu Xiaobo and his family are not free to choose doctors nor are 

they free to travel abroad for possibly life-saving treatment. 

Liu Xiaobo is due to be released in 2 years after serving 9 out 

of an 11-year imprisonment for his role in Charter 08. He has pracVerDate Nov 24 2008 08:36 Jan 29, 2018 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00017 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 U:\26342.TXT PAT
14 

tically been in secret imprisonment. His wife has been put under 

house arrest since 2010. The outside world knows almost nothing 

about what happened to him inside the prison walls. Secrecy created the perfect conditions for abuse—torture, mistreatment, including medical neglect and deprivation of adequate care. 

Secret detention, persecution of family members by association, 

mistreatment in prison including deprivation of medical treatment 

are routinely used by the Chinese Government to punish human 

rights lawyers, activists, political or religious dissidents, especially 

in ethnic minority regions Tibet and Xinjiang. 

Activist Cao Shunli died from denied medical treatment in detention on March 14, 2014 after she was hospitalized in critical condition, while authorities had previously rejected her lawyers’ multiple 

requests for ‘‘medical bail.’’ Five days after Cao Shunli’s death, the 

Tibetan political prisoner Goshul Lobsang died due to torture and 

lack of medical treatment in detention. One human rights organization has kept a Medical Watch List tracking cases of currently 

detained or imprisoned individuals who suffer from deteriorating 

health and have been deprived of adequate medical treatment and 

denied release on medical grounds. 

How should the United States Congress respond to the Chinese 

Government’s human rights problems? Four suggestions: 

1. One stance that Congress can take is also most obvious one, 

but often seeming the most difficult one, which I have previously 

discussed in this forum. It is simply to be consistent and steadfast. 

Let me explain: The CECC and the State Department both produce 

carefully-researched annual human rights reports based on excellent data and expertise analysis. But these reports bear little relevance to U.S. polices toward China, where human rights tend to 

be overpowered by trade business or regional strategic interests. 

Data and facts in these congressional and government reports 

about China’s worsening human rights problems often do not have 

a voice in such polices. I know this may sound naive and simplistic. 

But being consistent and sticking to one set of human rights standards in Congressional resolutions, whether it concerns Cuba or 

Iran or North Korea or China, is what gives U.S. human rights polices a measure of credibility. 

2. My second thought is that Congress should continue to support programs or organizations that assist victims of rights abuses. 

For instance, right now, Congress should press the Administration 

to issue a standing invitation to Liu Xiaobo and his family immediately and make contingency plans to make sure that he receive 

the best treatment and care this country can offer, if the Chinese 

Government let them go. The EU funds ‘‘emergency relocation and 

shelter programs’’ that evacuate and assist human rights defenders 

at high risk. Congress must guard our political refugee programs 

against xenophobia. 

3. Congress must urge the Administration to comply with the 

Global Magnitsky Accountability Act to seek accountability for 

rights abuses. Congress passed this Act and it was signed into law 

last year. It is a brave new tool that the U.S. Government must 

use to hold perpetrators and corrupt officials in the Chinese Government accountable. For years, critics of economic sanctions argued that they’d hurt the average Chinese and many of us have reVerDate Nov 24 2008 08:36 Jan 29, 2018 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00018 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 U:\26342.TXT PAT
15 

alized that U.S.-China human rights dialogues have produced no 

real impact. Now, this new law can be used to target abusive officials, with no quota restriction on how many from which countries 

could be designated, as long as credible evidence against them can 

be presented. But the decision is with the Administration, where 

such decisions might very well be subjected to the whims of other 

priorities. Congress should make sure that the President’s other interest in China do not get in the way of holding Chinese officials 

accountable for human rights abuses. 

4. One other suggestion is that Congress should support U.S. actions holding the Chinese Government accountable for its failures 

to live up to its international human rights obligations. China is 

a member of the Human Rights Council. It has signed or ratified 

7 of the 10 major human rights treaties, such as the Convention 

against Torture, which China ratified 29 years ago. Yet the Chinese Government continues to derail rule of law reforms, undercut 

any independence of the judiciary, and disregard legal safeguards 

for detainees from torture. 

As China becomes a raising world power, the government’s systematic human rights abuses raise serious questions about its 

credibility or fitness to take global leadership in areas where the 

United States is retreating. The Chinese Government has a clear 

track-record of signing up for international human rights treaties 

while violating them outright back home and in countries where 

it’s investing, lending money, and building infrastructures. It’s important to lay bare this track record of deceit and hypocrisy. A government that can’t honor its own commitments, can’t keep its own 

promises, has no credibility. Congress should urge the Administration to actively engage other member states at the United Nations 

to keep out governments with worsening human rights conditions 

from the Human Rights Council. Dig in, do not retreat from that 

multilateral battleground to fight abusive government and stand 

up for victims. 

Chairman RUBIO. We thank all of you for being here today. 

We will now begin to the questions, to all four of them, right? 

[Laughter]. 

All right. I am going to let—we are going to hear first on the 

question round from the Cochairman. 

And we thank you for opening the hearing today. 

Representative SMITH. Thank you for your leadership, Mr. Chairman, which has been extraordinary for many, many years. 

Let me just—there was an excellent and incisive op-ed in The 

Washington Post on June 27th, co-wrote by Yang Jianli, who is 

here, who has testified before this Commission on several occasions, and Jared Genser. 

And just very briefly reading from it, and you will see why I am 

raising it in a moment, they pointed out, ‘‘As China’s power and 

influence have increased, Western democracies have collectively engaged on self-censorship on human rights, choosing to prioritize 

what they have clearly believed to be their more important interests over their purported values. In the past five years, since Xi became president, discussions of human rights have been relegated to 

fruitless dialogues with the Chinese foreign ministry, which has 

never had any power over domestic concern.’’ 

16 

‘‘President Barack Obama,’’ they went on, ‘‘led the West in playing down concerns with China on human rights and was conspicuous by his unwillingness to help Liu, his fellow Nobel Peace 

Prize laureate. He raised Liu Xiaobo’s case publicly only once after 

he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. And whatever he might 

have said privately clearly had no impact. At the same time, he did 

not join the 134 Nobel laureates to a letter to Xi Jinping and did 

not publicly condemn Liu Xia’s detention under house arrest, and 

even threatened to veto a bill passed by the Senate to rename the 

street in front of the Chinese embassy Liu Xiaobo Plaza.’’ 

Finally, ‘‘Chinese security officials even exploited the United 

States’ repeated refusal to help the Lius in torture sessions with 

detained Chinese dissidents. They explained to their victims that 

they surely must have observed that Washington had refused to 

help the world’s only imprisoned Nobel Peace Prize laureate and 

his wife—so what hope could they expect when they disappeared, 

tortured or imprisoned? The American refusal of support to Liu 

Xiaobo gave Xi Jinping license to act with total impunity to repress 

domestic dissent.’’ 

In 1994 on one of many trips to the People’s Republic of China, 

I met with Wei Jingsheng for dinner. He had just been let out of 

prison in an attempt by the Chinese Government, one high-value 

political prisoner, to get Olympics 2000. They did not, he got rearrested and was brutalized, finally came here on humanitarian 

parole, near death. 

He told me something I will never forget. When you are weak 

and vacillating and kowtowing to this dictatorship, they beat us 

more in the prison camps, in the laogai. When you are tough, predictable, with professionalism, they beat us less. 

We have seen eight years of retreat by the Obama administration. As the chairman knows, he and I have co-chaired hearings 

over these years pleading with the Obama administration to take 

a tougher stance. 

I believe and hope the long overdue sea change in support for 

human rights in China may be changing. The President, of the 

United States Donald Trump, has already denied funding to the 

United Nations Population Fund, because of their horrific complicity in the coercive population control program, a program that 

began in 1979. There are now 62 million missing girls. That is the 

disparity; there are far more that have been killed simply because 

they are girls. 

And yesterday, Secretary Tillerson named China as a tier-three 

country, egregious violator of human trafficking. 

We had hearing after hearing asking the previous secretaries of 

state and the Obama administration to name China tier three and 

sanction them and they would not do it. There was one automatic 

downgrade that was required by the law, but they would not do it 

because of the facts. 

We think, I think that we may be seeing a change of heart by 

the U.S. Government, which bodes well for the human rights lawyers, the political prisoners, the religious prisoners. And that is our 

hope. 

Two things already: The President’s administration, I said before, Nikki Haley has said, yes, we do want him to be allowed to 

17 

leave along with his wife, Liu Xiaobo, and hopefully that will be 

the case. 

So, I do have just one question, and if there is time permitting 

I have many more to follow after the distinguished chairman. 

But, Dr. Teng, you are one of the founders of the Human Rights 

Accountability Center which is aiming at using the Global 

Magnitsky Act to bring sanctions against China’s human rights violators. What has been your experience so far with the new administration? 

It is a new law, obviously. But is there an openness to singling 

out and holding individuals to account for torture and other gross 

violations of human rights? 

Mr. TENG. Thank you very much. After the Global Magnitsky Act 

enacted, we have founded the China Human Rights Accountability 

Center this January. And we tried our best to collect the information, the evidence of the human rights abusers and corrupt officials, including the current minister of public security. 

And we have provided materials to the State Department. And 

we have established a website. 

So first is, it is difficult to collect some information and sometimes it is hard to meet the requirement of the American government. 

And second, we understand that the President of the United 

States has discretion power to use this Magnitsky Act more or less. 

So, I do hope the American Congress, the CECC, can send a clear 

message now to give pressure to the White House and the President. Now it is very, very important to implement the Global 

Magnitsky Act, especially regarding Chinese corrupt officials and 

perpetrators because the United States should not be a safe haven 

to Chinese perpetrators and corrupt officials. Thank you. 

Chairman RUBIO. This is a general question for the whole panel. 

If you speak to people involved in setting policy in the new administration, their argument is they do want to raise human rights 

issues, but they believe they are best raised one-on-one in private 

meetings in an effort to allow the Chinese Communist Party officials to save face, in essence to not be embarrassed publicly, that 

they respond better to a private, one-on-one settings as opposed to 

public denunciations of the kind that we are conducting here today. 

The flipside of it is, I know that one of the arguments oppressors 

make, not just in China, but all over the world to the oppressed 

is nobody cares about you, everyone has forgotten about you, you 

might as well give up because you are just not important enough, 

and the United States is not going to harm their relations with us 

because of your case. 

What is your view on, number one, the idea that somehow 

human rights are best raised with the Chinese officials privately 

versus the sort of more open, you know, more open highlighting of 

these cases for the world to see? 

And second, is what we do here, irrespective of the administration, is what we do here, whether it is on this Commission, on the 

Senate floor, on the House floor, in our letters and our resolutions, 

does it matter, does it make a difference? 

I certainly know they read it in the Chinese Government because 

I know they get upset about it, but what about the activists? What 

18 

impact does it have? Because it is important for our colleagues 

sometimes to understand the impact that what we do here is not 

simply symbolic. And if it is, I want to know that, too, obviously. 

So two separate questions: Is there the view of the private versus 

public? And second, what about our role here in Congress and 

when we have meetings on this Commission or make statements 

or do resolutions, does that have an impact, does that matter? 

And if you want to go first, Mr. Halliday. 

Mr. HALLIDAY. I cannot say what kind of efficacy there is in private interventions, but China’s government seems much to prefer 

these. 

However, in my empirical research and the work of our team, 

speaking to many activist lawyers over many years, there is absolutely no doubt in their minds that China must be spoken to publicly and China must be publicly shamed. 

I have no doubt that when the world speaks out loud and publicly, China listens. China has a very thin skin. 

When the American Bar Association awarded its international 

human rights prize to detained lawyer activist Wang Yu, within 48 

hours, the Global Times had an editorial trying to rebut that recognition. That tells me that not only was China listening, but 

China felt it had to respond. 

And finally, the point that you made, Mr. Chairman, is that in 

our interviews with notable activists, time and again they have 

said that when there is a public call for their release or public call 

for news about them, their treatment is improved. They can perceptibly point to the day, the week, or the month when their treatment changes as the international community turns the spotlight 

publicly on their plight. 

Mr. TENG. Yes. I think both private and public pressure dialogues are useful. But I think, this kind of pressure should not be 

only lip service. It should be giving real pressure to the Chinese 

Government and there should be a follow up. So you should send 

a clear message to Chinese Government that this human rights 

issue or at least the political prisoners or one certain case, you 

know, really matters. And it should have a negative consequence 

if you do not respect your own constitution or the international 

human rights standard. 

And when I was detained and tortured the United States is my 

important hope. So if the United States refuses to pay attention to 

Chinese freedom and human rights and the people in the prison, 

the people would be very hopeless. 

Mr. XIA. I think that both private and publicly is needed. Because for the private part, I think for the individual cases, like 

Chen Guangcheng, the American government can talk to the Chinese Government personally to save those individuals in specific 

cases. 

And for the public, sort of for the underprivileged people who are 

under threat. So, I think the private should work for the lawyers 

and human rights defenders who are already persecuted and the 

public ways working for the underprivileged people to protect them 

in the future. 

And I think that the Congress is definitely working. It is not just 

our voice being heard. But for example, I went to the Chinese emVerDate Nov 24 2008 08:36 Jan 29, 2018 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00022 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 U:\26342.TXT PAT
19 

bassy with my petition and my signatures, but as a Chinese legal 

citizen nobody would even see me. But I can talk through here, and 

the Congress has the power to talk with the White House, and the 

White House has the power to summon the Chinese ambassador to 

respond to my petition. So, I definitely think that Congress is doing 

some work. 

Thank you very much. 

Ms. T4Li. I think it is just a matter of accountability. Like, whatever is privately said, nobody knows who is going to hold people accountable, both the Chinese officials and the United States officials. We do not know what was promised, what was raised. And 

how can you hold anybody accountable if nothing happens afterwards? 

And the other issue is the information in bans. In China, there 

is already so much secrecy, secret detentions, secret interrogations, 

disappearances, and now they just revised the government public 

information disclosure to make it practically no information would 

be disclosed. So we already do not know so many things and then 

we are going to advocate further secrecy in human rights discussions? 

I think we are not on the playing field when we are talking about 

United States officials meeting with Chinese officials. So, I think 

abusers of human rights are mostly afraid of the sunshine, they are 

afraid of information, they are afraid of the people knowing what 

they did and afraid of being asked to change their behaviors. 

Chairman RUBIO. In the past when we have interacted with 

rights activists and others in China, a number of them have told 

us that they have experienced some level of harassment, even 

when here in the United States, even on Capitol Hill actually by 

those working on behalf of the oppressors. 

But more importantly, the sort of implied threat that they could 

reach them anywhere in the world, that if they had to reach out 

and affect their lives in some way, they could do it, that they really 

were not safe anywhere, these sort of threats. 

I just wanted to ask because all of you have been so vocal and 

open on some of these issues. Have any of you, if you are comfortable sharing obviously, ever felt as if you have been the subject 

of that sort of implied or direct threat of intimidation, either here 

while present in the continental United States, even perhaps because of your appearance here today? 

And if you are not comfortable saying, then obviously that is an 

answer, too. 

Mr. XIA. I would like to share some of my experience. After my 

father was arrested, he was completely missing. We did not receive 

any word, so we do not know where they took them or who took 

them. That is one of the pressures we got. 

And the police also summoned my mom to ask her to divorce my 

father. And I was on a certain list, my mom, that is the reason why 

my family sent me here to keep me safe. 

But I think the first two years, I was threatened by the government and I kept silent. 

Chairman RUBIO. I apologize. The first two years while you were 

still in China or while you were here? 

Mr. XIA. Here, yes. My first two years here. 

20 

Chairman RUBIO. How were you threatened? 

Mr. XIA. For example, the lawyer Wang Yu, his family members 

just taken away by the secret agents in the airport. And also, the 

police officers went to my family friends and other family members 

to threaten them. And me and my mom kind of got isolated. So, 

I am just worrying about everything and I was scared. I just kept 

silent here. 

But I have learned what is right to do and what is justice, I 

would say, so the pressure turned to my power and I would have 

a chance to speak here. 

Chairman RUBIO. So to be clear, while you were here already for 

the—how long have you been here now? 

Mr. XIA. Two years. 

Chairman RUBIO. In the two years that you have been here, 

there were times where you chose, at least initially, to be careful 

what you said or spoke out for fear of retribution against friends 

and/or loved ones in China? 

Mr. XIA. Yes. So, yes, basically, they just went to my mom and 

I was scared. Yeah. Because when the police officer broke into my 

house, I was there, I saw everything. And honestly, my family did 

not share with me all the political stuff when I was a child. So, I 

was scared badly, yes. 

Chairman RUBIO. Mr. Biao. 

Mr. TENG. I have a lot of stories that my friends, including Chen 

Guangcheng and some activists in the United States, were intimidated by the Chinese Government when they were here, even including some activists were attacked physically when they were in 

a protest. 

I myself, when I was—— 

Chairman RUBIO. Attacked physically here in the United States? 

Mr. TENG. In California, yes, by some unidentified persons. And 

obviously, they were hired by the Chinese Government or Chinese 

embassy. 

And when I was in Boston at Harvard Law School, my wife and 

one of my daughters were banned from going to the United States, 

so we were separated for nearly one year. Obviously, the purpose 

of their travel ban is to silence me. 

And last winter, my wife was fired by the company she was 

working for because of the clear pressure from the Chinese Government. So they use all kinds of collective punishment to marginalize, 

to silence, to intimidate the human rights activists in the United 

States. 

Chairman RUBIO. Okay. I know the Cochairman has further 

questions. 

Representative SMITH. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

Can I just ask you, Mr. Teng, you might want to speak to this, 

how the crackdown on lawyers, and maybe, Mr. Halliday, you as 

well, the crackdown on lawyers, how has it impacted on civil society? It seems when you go after lawyers, the impact has to be even 

more profound. 

We know the NGO law, the religious freedom crackdown that 

has gotten even worse on Xi Jinping, tightening the screws, making 

it harder and harder. 

21 

And then when you are the last resort, and, Dr. Li, you might 

want to speak to this as well, does this just chill civil society? 

Mr. TENG. Yes. Internally, there are altogether 300,000 lawyers, 

but only several hundred human rights lawyers. And during the 

709 crackdown, almost all active and famous human rights lawyers 

were either arrested, disappeared, or interrogated. So for the whole 

civil society, it is harder than before to find a human rights lawyer 

to represent their cases, so the vulnerable groups, the Tibetans, 

Uyghurs, Falun Gong and other religious groups, the petitioners. 

So they were also targeted, many of these other activists. And I 

know house churches were arrested and sentenced. And lawyers 

have more risk than before to take these sensitive cases. 

So the chilling effect of the roundup of human rights lawyers is 

very strong. And many lawyers have to give up and have to keep 

silent. But on the other hand, some new lawyers can still stand up 

to join the human rights movement and some new activists are 

courageous enough to stand up, to speak out. 

So what the government wants to achieve is some total silence, 

but I do not think the Communist Party can destroy the whole civil 

society, the whole movement completely. 

Thank you. 

Representative SMITH. Let me just—yes, Dr. Halliday? 

Mr. HALLIDAY. May I add that civil society comprises a vast 

number of people in China. And following Dr. Teng Biao, the Communist Party’s apparent belief that it is possible indefinitely to repress hundreds and hundreds of millions of people who want to be 

able to express their views or who want legal representation, seems 

highly questionable. 

If you imagine the Christians alone, 80 million to 100 million 

Christians, China’s largest civil society group, can you entirely cut 

them off from any kind of connection or leadership with these notable activist lawyers or grassroots lawyers more broadly. 

But it does seem clear to me that the intent of the Party is to 

take lawyers who were previously able to represent people in the 

kinds of grievances that Dr. Teng Biao has just mentioned and suddenly change the minds of the Chinese people about the role that 

these lawyers play. 

As one eminent China specialist has said, in the past, lawyers 

were seen as representatives of people who were vulnerable and 

had grievances. Now, with charges of subversion against lawyers 

China’s leaders are saying that lawyers are enemies of the state, 

lawyers are enemies of the Party, lawyers are enemies of China. 

So there seems a very deliberate effort simultaneously to crush 

civil society, which I cannot believe can continue indefinitely, and 

at the same time to disconnect civil society from the kind of leadership offered by activist lawyers. 

Representative SMITH. Yes, Dr. Li. 

Ms. LI. In fact, the crackdown on lawyers is shorthand because 

a lot of them are not lawyers. For example, Teng Biao mentioned 

Wu Gan who is still in detention facing trial. And several of them 

have already been sentenced, like Hu Shigen and—as I said, yes, 

these people are also—crackdown on lawyers. 

And the second point I think you brought up is the overseas 

NGO law. You know, we have a lot of international NGOs proVerDate Nov 24 2008 08:36 Jan 29, 2018 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00025 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 U:\26342.TXT PAT
22 

testing. But in fact, the law most directly impacts domestic Chinese 

NGOs because several leaders of those NGOs have been detained, 

they have been interrogated and incriminated for taking foreign 

funding or working with foreign organizations. 

We should particularly mention Wang—and those are local 

human rights NGO directors. 

And the third point I want to say is, China has systematically 

been revising or putting out new laws, like the national security 

law, the international security law, the anti-terror act, and one by 

one further restricting space for civil society and using state security to persecute people in not only physical space for organizing, 

for freedom of association, but the online space for speech and information. 

So what we are looking at, it is not only the unusual quiet of 

civil society, but also the infrastructure changed to further repress 

any development of civil society. 

Representative SMITH. I just have one more question and one 

comment, if I could. 

If there are any lobbyists or lawyers representing the Chinese 

embassy here today, you do not have to stand up, but it would be 

nice if you would. But I would ask you, and I mean this with respect, would you be willing to take the petitions with some 90,000 

signatures back to the Chinese embassy? 

Come and see me or one of the witnesses or Chairman Rubio before the hearing is over. But it would be nice if you would consider 

doing that. 

I, too, have gone to the Chinese embassy to deliver petitions. And 

we stood outside and never even got in through the door. It was 

appalling, lack of diplomatic civility. 

My final question would be to Dr. Li or anyone who would like 

to speak to it. Back in the 1980s, I traveled, I have been here since 

1981, with Armando Valladares who Ronald Reagan so wisely 

picked to be our head of delegation, made an ambassador. He had 

spent, as Marco Rubio knows, who has been absolutely tenacious 

in fighting against human rights abuse all over the world, but including Cuba. 

Armando Valladares wrote a book ′′Against All Hope′′ which revealed the absolute and horrific use of torture and all kinds of repression by the Castro brothers and the entire regime. 

And my takeaway from that trip, besides pushing for human 

rights in Cuba, was the hypocrisy of the United Nations Human 

Rights Commission. That was replaced by the Human Rights Council, which was with promises and bells and whistles about how it 

would be different. And yet, rogue players, including Cuba today, 

China today, sit on that panel and spend most of their time criticizing Israel while China, even during its periodic review, gets 

through almost unscathed. 

On one of those more recent trips to Geneva for a Human Rights 

Council meeting, I went to the press conference being hosted by the 

Chinese and asked one question after another of their ambassador 

who finally just shut down and left and walked out the door because they did not want to answer any real questions. They wanted 

softballs by a compliant press, kissy-faced diplomacy by people who 

23 

say, oh, are you not just great and making progress, while people 

are being tortured and treated with impunity. 

My question would be, and, Dr. Li, you might want to speak to 

is, as backers of the Convention Against Torture, Manfred Nowak, 

I may be wrong on this, was the last one to actually get into China 

as a special rapporteur. And that was, what, 2005? And yet, we get 

all this talk and this talk of transparency and openness, and yet 

special rapporteurs cannot get in to look at the torture situation. 

And I would just say parenthetically, when I was pushing 

against what Google was doing in censoring the internet and doing 

just what the Chinese Government wanted it to do, when you went 

and put in ‘‘torture,’’ and I did it myself in a cafe later on, years 

later in an internet cafe in Beijing, you write in ‘‘torture’’ and you 

get Gitmo and you get what the Japanese did, which was horrific, 

to the Chinese during the Second World War. Nothing about 

Manfred Nowak’s work or any of the other commentaries on the 

pervasive use of torture by the Chinese. 

How do we get the United Nations Human Rights Council—I 

have brought it up personally with Prince Zeid, the high commissioner for human rights, and said the respectability of your group 

and the council itself as well as your bureaucracy are compromised 

when you look the other way. And that is what is happening 

through these horrific offenses now against human rights defenders 

by human rights abusers with the prevalent use of torture. 

How do we reform the Human Rights Council and get the United 

Nations to finally step up and say—as was said earlier in testimony they are thin-skinned. When that ambassador walked off the 

stage, it was, like, let us engage, however long it takes, show me 

where I am wrong. You know, and I, of course, have had a lot of 

documentation in my hand I handed to one of his deputies as he 

walked out the door. 

Ms. LI. When China was being voted for the last Human Rights 

Council membership, among 193 countries, 185 voted for China. 

The number could be 184, 186, but it is about that many. So do 

the math, where are the pro-democracy, pro-human rights governments? What are they voting? Whom are they voting? 

So it is very difficult to fight at the United Nations for human 

rights abusers, just as here, in this country, everywhere. But that 

is not a reason for us to back down. 

And the way I am saying this is, first, when the United Nations 

high commissioner for human rights sends out a statement about 

lawyers, about Liu Xiaobo, about Tibet, China protests immediately. That means it matters. It matters when voices are coming 

out of that forum. 

During any kind of treaty review of China’s obligations to not 

only the Commission Against Torture, but socioeconomic rights, 

rights of the child, they would send a huge delegation. To do what? 

To work on the members of the treaty committees one-on-one to 

issue threats, to basically just try to get them to talk differently. 

And this did not work in most cases, I think, as the members are 

pretty independent. 

So what it means is that the Chinese Government does care 

about face and they do not want to lose face in those forums. That 

means it is important for us to present solid evidence at the same 

24 

time while the government is trying to influence those reviewing 

processes, including the Universal Periodic Review. Civil society 

should also use that forum. Other governments should also use 

that forum to fight them nail and tooth to really be using that 

forum rather than saying, OK, we give up, when this forum is discredited, we are out of here. 

Then you know what is going to happen? China is increasing its 

donation to the United Nations and they are becoming ever more 

active in the Human Rights Council and all the United Nations 

human rights forums. And they are going to buy, they are going 

to lobby, they are going to get votes from other countries. And they 

are going to not only get away from their human rights violations, 

but change that institution. 

They wanted to rewrite the treaties, they wanted to do all that 

to get away from basically. So, I think all this means it is a very 

important battleground, we should not give up on it. 

Mr. HALLIDAY. Mr. Cochairman, may I also say that as a U.S. 

citizen and as an observer of international influences on China, I 

feel it is imperative that the U.S. Government should maintain its 

leadership position in the United Nations Human Rights Council. 

I know you raised the question of reform and I know that there 

are issues there. Nevertheless, it is critical that China does not 

erode or dilute universal norms of law or lawyers or rights. 

And the Human Rights Council, despite its defects, is nevertheless a prominent forum. It is a prominent forum not only for states 

that will be outspoken and bold in support of the international 

moral and political order, but it is a crucial forum for non-state organizations to be able to bring their observations into this United 

Nations forum. It asserts global norms and maintains some kind of 

level of accountability. 

I would say, frankly, that for the United States to surrender to 

an authoritarian country like China would be defeatist and, indeed, 

ultimately, it will be counterproductive, both for the foreign policy 

of the United States, but also for the international moral and legal 

order. 

Thank you. 

Representative SMITH. Thank you. 

Chairman RUBIO. I just have one follow-up question on that. And 

that is, for example, about two weeks ago we saw the nation of 

Panama break its relations with Taiwan for purposes of appeasing 

a position that China had exerted influence. 

I have had cities in my home state come to me and ask for us 

to open the way for Chinese consulates. But, of course, the price 

of opening a Chinese consulate in a city is the closure of a Taiwanese one. So we know that these efforts that you have described 

in terms of pressure diplomatically, they also exert on nations outside that context and even here domestically. 

And I was just curious whether anyone here had had an experience here in the United States where you were either not allowed 

to speak or disinvited at a university, to a business, at a media outlet, anywhere where you felt that perhaps your voice, that your potential hosts were dissuaded from giving you an opportunity to participate because of pressure from China here in the United States. 

25 

Mr. TENG. Yes. So, I have two examples. My scheduled speeches 

were canceled by universities in the United States. 

Chairman RUBIO. Which ones, which universities? 

Mr. TENG. One is Harvard. 

Chairman RUBIO. Harvard. 

Mr. TENG. Yes. 

Chairman RUBIO. Why did they tell you they canceled the 

speech? 

Mr. TENG. I think two years ago when the president of Harvard 

was visiting China and Chen Guangcheng and I were going to give 

a speech at Harvard and they canceled it. 

And I think last time when I was here, I gave a testimony about 

my own book, it was canceled by ABA, American Bar Association. 

So they invited me to write a book and I signed the agreement, but 

they later rescinded the proposal saying that publishing my book 

will endanger their programs in China. 

Chairman RUBIO. So the American Bar Association, which represents lawyers and, therefore, defenders of justice, canceled the 

publication of a book that they invited you to write because they 

were afraid it endangered their programs in China? 

Mr. TENG. Yes. 

Chairman RUBIO. We did write a letter in that regard, but I want 

people to hear that so that they understand that this is not something happening halfway around the world. They are doing it to 

people and organizations in the United States with, I imagine, the 

threat of being unable to participate in activities in China, either 

economic or other repercussions. 

Is there any other—do you have another one, or those are the 

two that come to mind? You said there were two universities. Do 

you remember what the second one way? 

Mr. TENG. No, no, just—— 

Chairman RUBIO. Harvard. 

Mr. TENG. Yes. So there are some other examples. They tried to 

invite me, but because I am sensitive, I am going to talk about 

human rights, politics, and they refuse to invite me. 

And a lot of experiences that when I was giving a talk in a university, the other department, like Chinese department or Confucius Institute, they refuse to forward the posters and they told 

their students not to come to my presentation. 

Chairman RUBIO. Did someone else have something to add? I 

thought I—anyone else have a similar experience that they could 

share? 

Well, do you have any further questions? 

Representative SMITH. No, just thank you again, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman RUBIO. Well, I thank you all for being here. I know at 

varying degrees, but across the board it takes some level of real 

courage, we have heard, not just about the threats of cancellation, 

but the real risks to family. And we are blessed to live in this republic where oftentimes the worst thing that happens is somebody 

says something really mean about us on Twitter. 

And these hearings are a good reminder that in many parts of 

the world, including the most populous nation on earth, the consequences of speaking out or dissent are significantly higher. And 

I think it speaks to the essence of who we want to be as a nation, 

26 

as a people. Is America simply a geographic territory? Or is it also 

an idea? And if we are an idea, then that idea is that we believe 

all human beings are entitled to rights that are given to them at 

birth by their Creator and government’s job is to protect them, not 

to decide them and certainly not to deny them. 

And we seek not to impose our point of view on the world. Some 

people would disagree with that statement, but I am not. 

Nor do we seek to contain China. China is an ancient, revered 

culture with thousands of years of contribution to mankind, some 

of the greatest inventions and innovations in human history came 

from China. It is a nation with an incredible history and I believe 

an incredible future. 

I welcome China’s rise in many ways. I do not welcome a totalitarian state’s rise. I do welcome China’s rise because I believe its 

people have the opportunity to contribute. And we seek partnership 

with the people of China to solve—just think about the problems 

in the world today. If somehow there was a Chinese Government 

that cared about the rights of all mankind, combined with it could 

work together with us, I think we would be a lot further along on 

some of the major issues confronting this country. 

But when you do not care about the rights of your own people, 

why would you care about the rights of anybody else? And that is 

our problem with the Chinese Communist Party and its leadership, 

not its people. 

And I remain hopeful that that will change. But in the interim, 

we will continue hopefully to speak on behalf of those who agree 

with us, but do not have the opportunity to express it openly in the 

nation of their birth. 

So we are just grateful to all of you for being here and for your 

time, for your testimony, for your contribution. We look forward to 

sharing your testimony with our colleagues and continuing to address these issues time and again. 

And with that, thank you for starting the meeting today, again, 

to our cochairman. 

With that, our hearing is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 3:55 p.m. the hearing was concluded.] 

(27) 

A P P E N D I X 

28 

PREPARED STATEMENTS

PREPARED STATEMENT OF TERENCE C. HALLIDAY

JUNE 28, 2017

INTRODUCTION

Mr. Chairman, Mr. Cochairman, and distinguished Members of the Commission, 

I am privileged to be invited to participate in this hearing. I have a long-standing 

admiration for the work of the Commission. 

In my opening remarks, I address the meaning and significance of China’s unprecedented crackdown on lawyers almost two years after its onset in early July, 2015. 

My comments are derived from the empirical research of my research team into 

criminal procedure law and criminal defense lawyers over the past twelve years. 

Our findings, published in our book, Criminal Justice in China, concludes that China’s legal system and legal profession have come an enormous distance since enactment of the 1979 Criminal Procedure Law. Nevertheless, on a critical number of 

issues integral to the defense of basic legal freedoms, China has turned away from 

reform both in its law and its treatment of a key segment of the legal profession. 

A sudden turning point occurred on July 9, 2015 when China launched a nationwide crackdown on activist lawyers. 

The ‘709 crackdown,’ as it has been colloquially labeled, has been unprecedented 

in scale and severity. Within days, hundreds of lawyers across China were detained, 

disappeared and interrogated. Lawyers have been intimidated, tortured, charged 

with serious crimes and sanctioned severely. 

Why did this crackdown occur? 

Research on activist lawyers reveals deep grievances held by hundreds of millions 

of Chinese who suffer from health-threatening pollution, from takings of their 

houses and land, from widening inequality, from religious controls and persecution, 

from discriminatory treatment of minorities, from inadequate protection of workers 

and women, and from exploitation and vulnerability of migrant laborers, among others. 

The sheer quantity of disaffected and angry populations can fuel widespread unrest. Lawyers often become the help of last resort when every other channel has 

failed. Therefore, over the past several years the Chinese Community Party has 

faced a double-threat to its survival: on the one hand, economic and social problems 

appear to be multiplying and intensifying; on the other hand, lawyers increasingly 

have been articulating and expressing those grievances through law in highly visible 

ways. 

What precipitated the crackdown on lawyers on July 9, 2015? 

1. Over the last several years, activist lawyers significantly increased in numbers. 

Hundreds of new activists, many of them young and well-educated, signaled their 

willingness to join the frontline. 

2. Lawyers magnified their ability to mobilize. Since 2011 lawyers increasingly 

came together as large defense teams in difficult trials. Through social media, activist lawyers could create instant crowds to rush to a courthouse or defend a lawyer 

being harassed by police. Nationwide online networks could mobilize hundreds of 

lawyers for new cases or emergency situations. 

3. The power of social media multiplied the impact of a new type of lawyer . Socalled ‘‘die-hard’’ lawyers actively used social media and street theatre to activate 

supporters and expose problems in defending their clients. Some lawyers had accumulated thousands or even millions of followers on Weibo, China’s equivalent to 

Twitter. 

Clearly, China’s leaders felt vulnerable to activist, die-hard and ordinary lawyers’ 

enhanced powers to mobilize publics. 

What motivates these lawyers to exhibit such courage in the face of a regime that 

does not hesitate to use inhumane and even life-threatening measures against its 

opponents? 

Our research reveals that courage for many lawyers arises from their own life experiences, such as harms to parents during the Cultural Revolution, participation 

in the 1989 Tiananmen student movement, or shocking experiences in their legal 

practice. 

Many lawyers build their courageous representation upon legal ideals that underwrite a good political society. First, they insist on protection of basic legal freedoms, 

such as right to be represented by a lawyer, due process in trials, and fair adjudicaVerDate Nov 24 2008 08:36 Jan 29, 2018 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00032 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6621 U:\26342.TXT PAT
29 

tion. They insist upon freedoms of speech, association and religion. Second, they are 

committed to a vibrant civil society as it is expressed through voluntary associations 

and an open public sphere. Third, these activist lawyers strongly oppose arbitrary 

executive power and call for checks and balances within the state. 

Our research documents that many lawyers, notable and ordinary practitioners, 

draw their courage also from their Christian faith. Christians insist upon the values 

of equality, most importantly, that in the eyes of God and the eyes of the law, said 

one, ‘‘Chairman Mao is as equal as me.’’ They champion the Judeo-Christian emphasis on a political and legal order that delivers justice, often quoting, like Martin Luther King, the biblical prophets Amos and Micah. They believe in fairness—that justice should be available reliably and fairly to all, whether they are Han Chinese or 

Tibetan, Party members or Falun Gong members. Finally, they hold China’s law accountable to God’s law. 

I consider it probable that Party leaders fear Christian lawyer-leaders who have 

strong relationships with Protestant churches across China and some who have significant international connections. 

What does the lawyer crackdown tell the world about China’s future? 

Viewing China through the lens of courageous lawyers reveals that legal change 

has turned toward repression, a repression which has taken deeply sobering turns 

since mid-2015. 

Nonetheless, deep impetuses for change remain within China. Repressive actions 

may be self-subversive. Notable activists refuse to surrender easily or to go quietly. 

Their wives, their comrades, spring to their defense. Significant numbers of grassroots lawyers continue to harbor visions of alternative legal-political futures. An 

international community ratchets up its efforts at solidarity, pressure and support 

for defense of lawyers. 

Where goes China may depend very considerably on where go its lawyers. Will 

it follow long peaceful paths of reform and the expansion of basic legal freedoms offered by the activist lawyers. Or will China lurch towards a violent explosive path 

that could lead to fearful unpredictable outcomes? 

RECOMMENDATIONS

The United States Government and the international community of states, international organizations, and publics should stand in solidarity with China’s activist 

lawyers and hold China’s practices strictly accountable to global standards, most importantly those inscribed in U.N. conventions, principles, and institutions. These are 

applicable to all persons, all places and all states without exception. 

The United States Government should maintain its leadership position in the 

United Nations Human Rights Council and other authoritative international bodies 

so that China does not erode or dilute universal norms of law, lawyers, and rights. 

The United States Government should use all means at its dispoal, including joint 

statements with other states, bilateral dialogues, and monitoring by U.S. agencies 

to press China to adhere to global standards in its treatment of all its lawyers, most 

especially those swept up in the crackdown. 

The current administration should strengthen the capacity of the U.S. Department of State and other executive agencies to monitor treatment of vulnerable populations in China and particularly lawyers who represent those populations. 

U.S. Government agencies, including the CECC, should mobilize U.S. firms operating in China to recognize the dangers their employees and partners face as China 

offers less and less protections to persons inside China who cross invisible lines 

being drawn and redrawn by China’s security apparatus. 

The United States should lead other states in the call for release of activists being 

punished for their rights defense work, and reject the criminalization of their legitimate exercise of rights protected by Chinese and international law. 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF TENG BIAO

JUNE 28, 2017

Mr. Chairman, Mr. Cochairman, and distinguished Members of CECC, I’m honored to be invited to testify at this specially important hearing. The coming July 

9, the 2nd anniversary of 709 crackdown, there will be events in DC, HK, Taiwan 

and some European cities to mark the inaugural china human rights lawyers day, 

which I have been organizing and coordinating for months. 

Chinese human rights lawyers have since 2003 become one of the most active and 

effective forces in China defending rights and freedom, and inevitably, have been 

the target of government’s persecution since the beginning of the rights defense 

30 

movement in China. Gao Zhisheng and other lawyers were put into prison and brutally tortured. Because of my work of promoting human rights and democracy since 

2003, I was disbarred, banned from teaching and eventually fired, banned from 

travelling, and kidnapped for three times by the secret police. In 2001 I was detained in a black jail for 70 days in an extreme form of solitary confinement, physically and mentally tortured. My wife and daughter were banned from travelling 

abroad, and my wife was fired the company she worked for due to the pressure from 

Chinese government. Collective punishment is frequently used by Chinese authorities to maximize intimidation. The purpose of torture and collective punishment was 

to make me stop my human rights work but I didn’t. 

The persecution of rights lawyers reached its peak on July 9, 2015, known as the 

‘‘709 crackdown.’’ More than 320 human rights lawyers were kidnapped, detained 

or interrogated. Eight of them are still in prison. Wang Quanzhang is still disappeared since July 28, 2015,his family and lawyers don’t even know whether he’s 

alive or dead. Dozens of lawyers were severely tortured, including beatings, electric 

shocks, sleep deprivation, prolonged interrogations, death threats, months or years 

of solitary confinement, humiliation, forcible televised confessions, so on and so on. 

Notably, it has been confirmed that many lawyers and activists were force-fed with 

medicines which caused them muscle pain, blurred vision and other physical and 

mental harm. 

The prison conditions and the treatment in detentions are extremely inhuman 

and cruel in China. Just the day before yesterday we received news that Nobel laureate Liu Xiaobo has been diagnosed with late-stage liver cancer. Ill treatment in 

custody may well have contributed to the disease; we know for certain deliberate 

neglect aggravated the cancer, given how advanced the disease appears. I request 

sincerely that you esteemed members of the Commission and all people who support 

freedom in China, please do something to urge Chinese government to 

immediately& unconditionally allow Liu Xiaobo to obtain medical treatment wherever he wants. 

Suppression has increased markedly not only against human rights lawyers, dissidents and NGOs, but also against media, churches, religious groups labeled ‘‘evil 

cults’’ including FalunGong, petitioners, activist netizens, liberalized scholars and 

artists. In a report published in February 2017, Chinese Human Rights Defenders 

(CHRD) documented the deteriorating situation of rights defenders and NGOs. 

Many new and ongoing cases of enforced disappearance, arbitrary detention, and 

acts of torture were reported, and the number of criminal detention and conviction, 

especially the use of ‘‘endangering state security charge’’ were increased. A human 

rights activist felt the difference, ‘‘There are no more ‘gray areas.’ To advocate for 

human rights in China today, you must be willing to accept the reality that the government views your work as ‘illegal’.’’ (CHRD 2017) Chinese government has obviously tightened control over information dissemination, teaching materials, publishing and social media. Some laws and regulations, with a clear purpose of controlling and oppressing the rights defense movement and civil society, were put into effect. State Security Law, Foreign NGO Management Law, Charity Law, Cyber security Law, etc, have already curtailed the development of rights activism and civil 

society, putting fundamental rights and freedom in danger. 

The ‘‘Rights Defence Movement’’ (weiquan yundong) has emerged since early 

2000s as a new focus of the Chinese democracy movement, after the Xidan Democracy Wall movement in late 1970s and the Tian’anmen Democracy movement in 

1989. The main political-social factors behind the rise of China’s rights defence 

movement are as follows: recovery of legal professions, new ideological discourse, 

new space for traditional media and the rise of the internet and social media, the 

development of the market economy, and China’s entry to global economy; the dissemination of liberalism ideas and expanded consciousness of civil rights. 

Let’s take a brief look at the history of the Chinese Communist Party. When the 

CCP was facing a deep political and economical crisis in the late 1970s after waves 

of political campaigns and the brutal Cultural Revolution, it had to introduce a process of legalization and marketization. Legalization was necessary for establishing 

social order and market economy and thus was beneficial to the political system 

when mass mobilization was not applicable to the political-social situation any more. 

Millions of laws and regulations were made, legal professions were recovered, but 

the CCP never meant to accept a democratic transition or a system with rule of law. 

Oppositional politics is prohibited, but as an unintended consequence, we lawyers 

and rights advocates tried our best to use existing legal channels to defend human 

rights and freedom. Starting with a narrow space, the rights defense movement attracted more and more supporters, such as lawyers, bloggers, pro-democracy scholars, petitioners, persecuted religious groups, victims of human rights abuse, and political dissidents. These are incredible achievements under such a repressive regime, 

31 

for the past 14 years, the development of the rights defense movement was expressed through at least four trends, namely, organization (zuzhi hua), street activism (jietou hua), politicization (zhengzhi hua) and internationalization (guoji hua). 

There is a clear limitation to China’s legalization, that is one-party rule, the number one priority of the CCP. Once the CCP senses the use of law could be a potential 

challenge, it never hesitates to nip it in the bud. Not long after the emergence of 

the rights defense movement, the Chinese government saw it as a real threat to the 

regime and never stopped its crackdown. When Xi jinping took his office, what the 

CCP was facing was increasing crisis: political, economical, social and ideological crisis. The calculation of Xi jinping and top CCP leaders is that without a ‘‘war on law’’ 

to destroy the resisting ability of the social and political movement a color revolution will occur and thus the monopoly of power of the CCP will be in danger. This 

is the political background of ‘‘709 crackdown’’, the worst crackdown on lawyers 

since the recovery of judicial system in late 1970s. 

Upon the more brutal suppression and tighter social control under Xi Jinping’s 

rule since 2013, some analysts asserted ‘‘the end of the rights defense movement’’, 

but, in my opinion, the idea of the rights defense movement is still showing its exuberant vitality, the spirit of the rights defense movement is still gaining moral and 

social support, and the persistence of the rights defense movement is still shaping 

China’s politics like unstoppable lightning in the darkness. 

Once again, the CCP’s war on law makes it urgent and necessary to change U.S. 

human rights policy towards China. 

In 1989, the CCP crushed a non-violent democracy movement with machine guns 

and tanks, killing hundreds of students and civilians. 28 years have passed since 

the Tiananmen massacre and it is a shock to many people when they take a retrospective look at what happened to the relationship between China and the rest of 

the world. In 1989, all democracies condemned the Tiananmen massacre, sanctioned 

Chinese dictators and supported Tiananmen activists in jail or in exile. Yet very 

soon Western leaders couldn’t wait to welcome Chinese butchers and dictators, rolling out their red carpet, replete with eager hugs and state banquets. In 1994 U.S. 

Government granted permanent most-favored-nation (MFN) status to China to 

delink human rights to trade, despite protests from human rights groups. Then 

China was allowed to enter the WTO and international markets. China was given 

the opportunity to host Olympics, World Expo, APEC and G20. China was voted in 

as a member of United Nations Human Rights Council again and again. 

Now China has become the second largest economy. China is playing an active 

and aggressive role on the international stage. The Asian International Investment 

Bank (AIIB), ‘‘One Belt One Road’’, South China Sea aggression, internet sovereignty, cyber attacks, abducting overseas booksellers and activists, Confusion institutes which erode academic freedom—the list goes on. China is demanding a rewrite of international norms, wanting to create a new international order in which 

rule of law is manipulated, human dignity is debased, democracy is abused, and justice is denied. In this international order, corruption and persecution are ignored, 

perpetrators are immune, and dictatorial regimes are united and smugly complacent. 

China then gained the clout to say no to the West and the West kowtows to China 

through self-censorship and a policy of appeasement. Besides short-term pragmatic 

interests, I would like to point out that U.S. human policy towards China has long 

been based on a series of erroneous theories and mistaken presumptions regarding 

Chinese politics and Chinese society. I don’t have time to go into details but the erroneous theories cover misunderstandings of China’s market, constitution, rule of 

law, international accountability, NGO, so on and so on. 

I’d like to offer a few recommendations here: 

• Link HR to trade and other important issues that the CCP cares about. • Implement the Global Magnitsky Act to ban Chinese perpetrators and corrupt 

officials from entering the United States. 

• Punish U.S. and western business which cooperate with Chinese authorities 

and participate in human rights abuses. 

• End the 110 Confucius Institutes in the United States educational institutions. 

• Don’t fund the oppressor. 

• Support real NGOs not GONGOs. 

• Name and shame. 

• Expel China from the United Nations Human Rights Council. 

A powerful and autocratic China will bring calamities to mankind. Supporting democracy and human rights in China not only corresponds to American declared values; it will also benefit American politics, society and economics in the long term. 

Please stand on the side of Chinese people, not on the side of Chinese Communist 

32 

Party. China should be represented by the human rights lawyers, activists, dissidents and all Chinese people fighting for freedom and democracy, not the illegitimate Party and government. 

33 

JUNE 28, 2017


26342.001

Prepared Statement of Xia Chongyu 

June 28, 2017 

Dear Congressmen and respectfi.Ii audiences, Ladies and gentlemen. I am Chongyu Xia, son of 

Chinese human rights lawyer Lin Xi a. It is such a great honor to share about my father's situation and 

what my family has been though these past years. 

My father dedicates himself to be the voice for the voiceless and provides pro bono legal 

assistance to victims of human rights violation cases. On Nov. gth 2014, my father was abducted by 

secret agents without a warrant. The government did not inform my mother of my father's arrest until 

tlve days after the tact, and denied my father's basic right to meet with his defense attorney for three 

lull months. Meanwhile, the Police kept asking my father about the politically sensitive cases he 

represented. My father was physically and mentally tortured by the police, who used interrogation 

techniques such as shining a strong light on his eyes to keep him awake for days. They tried to break 

him so that he would confess to fraud, but all their attempts failed. After 600 days of imprisonment, he 

was unfairly tried in a closed door hearing. My father was denied a personal statement in court and 

none of the witnesses had a chance to testify. The second court of Beijing sentenced my father to 12 

years in prison for fraud without appropriate evidence. My father's final sentence was delivered 

without a fair second trail in Feb. 2014. No one ever accuses my father in person. 

I refuse to accept this illegal and unjust verdict. In April, l presented my petition at a Convocation 

of Liberty University, and the response was overwhelming. However, when ! tried to deliver my 
34 


26342.002

petition with over 14,000 signatures to the Chinese embassy, no one would see me. Before I left, I read 

my petition aloud at the gate of the embassy. 

At this moment, I have collected over 94,000 signatures. Most of them come from Americans, and 

the rest are ti·om other countries around the world. I am not alone. As a rising nation, China's 

deteriorating human rights record is unacceptable. When a human rights lawyer cannot secure his own 

fundamental rights, I believe every member's rights in the society are threatened. Alongside with me, 

there are some family members of other persecuted human rights lawyers. The father or husbands we 

deeply loved who selflessly helped the underprivileged people in China were persecuted in return. 

Human rights lawyers are the cornerstone of society. I hope the US. Government can increase its 

involvement in such cases in the future. Moreover, I wish the Congress of America could urge the 

Chinese government to stop controlling the judiciary system and stop the persecution against 709 

lawyers. Lastly, I plead that the White House summon the Chinese ambassador and ask the Chinese 

government to respond to me and my 94,000 petition supporters. Meanwhile, I recommend the White 

House or State Department issue a clear policy regarding this type of case. By making a clear stance, 

the U.S. Government would communicate to the world that human rights violations will not be 

tolerated. I appreciate the Congress f(lr organizing this hearing so that our voice could be heard by the 

world. 
35 


26342.003

Lin Xia s Background from CHDR(Chtnese Human Rights Defenders)----

Batkground 

Law Finn in f-h;ijing. \.Vas summon12d by pnticc for questioning in November 2014. He \\as later put umkr cnminal 

dct~:ntion, but his family did not not rcc~ivc an ofTiria! arrest notict:. Prior to that, authoritks in Beijing repeatedly 

blocked Xi a from visiling his client Guo Yushan ( ;;J:;_h i\J }, the founder or an independent think tank. Transilion 

Institute: Ciuo was seized during the suppression of .::;up porters of the I long Kong pro-democracy protests, one 

month bd{n·c Xia was "ummoncd. Xi a l.in was aho on the kgal tearn fOr Pu /hiqiang, vvho had been detained in 

0,:1ay ~014 for commcnwrating June Fourth. Police w~rc reportedly looking. into Xi a· s finances a few days bd()rt: 

he was taken away Policr.:: recommend Xi a be indicted in ~-1ay 15, 2015. \ )!1Jciab restricted X in l.ln's tH.:cess lO 

!c);!al coun-;cJ fOr months, but he was granted a visit in September 20 l5, a!ler v.:hit·h his lan·ycrs reported he was in 

good health. rhc procuratoratc indicted Xi a on Dcc~mbcr c, 2015. 

According to his L~l\\ ~,:crs- defense sta!emcnt authoriti-es accused Xi a of swindling over I 0 million 

RM!) (approximately l.S mil! ion USD) Jl·nm several individuals to pay off his gambling debt~. I I is laW)"'CT:-: 

confirmed Xia Lin had borrowed money. but had been prh·ah::ly knt via contnH.:t \vith the rdevunt parties and did 

not constitute a criminal act, let alone thwd. One of the individuals involved submittt:d evidence to court that h0 

freely lent money to Xia. und none of the four rdevant parties had l'Ver filed a criminal or civil suit against 

Xi a. They also argued in court that authorities had not provided any evidence of gambling debts, including such 

bnsic ini(Jrmntwn as the amounl tmcd and w \Yhom. Furthermore, X !a f inlold his lawyers thut the majority or 

police interrogation:; t(lcuscd on h1s past handling or··po!itically-s.cnsitiv~·· cases, questions about Occupy I long 
36 


26342.004

Kong, and his relationship \\ ith inthviduals such ns ( iuo Yu~han. Pu /hiqiang, and 1\i \\'ci\u.:i. among:;t others. 

and not the alleged rrnud. Xi a assert~d his innocence of th~ chHrgcs and said !he case is an act of reprisal f{w his 

protC~siona! work. 

l lis lawyers rmsed in trial the numerous legal ami procedural violations in Xi a Lin's case, including: deprivation or 

legal counseL mistreatment. such as gruelling interrogation sessions, shining bright lights on him, and extensive 

use of shackles. and refusing to grant the defence lawyers full access to the evidence. The c~mrt also refused to 

grant a request to exclude evidence ohtained hy torture after a witm.~ss testified that h~ had been threatened by 

polic~ to give C\ 1d~nct: against X ia I ,in, and did not alli)\ .\ the deftnte to call !heir\.\ itncsscs to testi!'y in X ill's 

defense_ nor allo\\' the dcftns~ ro question the other \Vitncsscs. 

The Beijing court convicted Xia on September ~2 ami sentenced him to I 2 years in prison and lined him I 20,000 

RMB. I !c was also order to repay 4 Sl million RMB to two victims_ Xi a said he \\-ill appeal the sentence and 

real'firmcd h1s innucl..!nce, according to his \.V!IC, \\ho told a media outlet after the sentencing that he shoutetl"l 

know this is revenge to me because I was the !:m·ycr for all those sensitive cases." Xia appealed the verdict but his 

appeal was reje-cted and the court upheld the original \·crdict: IHnvcvcr. his sentenced was reduced to 10 years. 

Born on Sepkrnbcr 15. 1970, Xia lin graduated from Southwest Institute of Political Science nnd Law (nmv 

Southwest University) 111 !992. l k pani~tpatcd in the 1989 pro-democrat~ movement while a student Aller 

graduation. he was assigned to work at the (Juizhou Province Public Security GurcHLL but he decided to become a 

lawyer instead. Afkr practicing hnv in Guizhnu J(w over a decade, Xi a tk:tidcd to move to lkijing. /\ccording to a 

close fl·icnd. his decision was intluc-nccd hy an article \\ rittcn by Yu Shicun ( ~t~ W. {/ ), a 1:-nnous essayist and 

intdlcctu;iL that critici1cd the generation \.\hO lived through 19g9 hut chose to neglc.cl that part ol'histnry. 

XIa has tak>..~n on man:· "'sensitive'- ca:--;es pro-bono. and he first gi.lined prommcncc in 2U06 for defending Cui 

Ying]ie (it>JL~\), a migrant \\Orker and strcd peddler who lwd kilkd un oflker rrom the City l!rbt!n 
37 


26342.005

i\dminiMnHlvc and Law !·:nrorcemcnt (chengguan) who had confiscated his properly_;\ year later. Cui rcccJvcd a 

death ~cntcncc with reprieve instead of imml:diatc execution. In 2009. Xi a represented Deng Y~iiao C~!r k {zlf ). a 

hotel worker ~,-dw killed in sd f.-defense a lo..:al official who tried to rap.:: her. In the end, Dcng avoided any 

cnminal punishment. That same year, 11long with Pu /hiqiang, Xia \\Orkcd on the case of arrested environmental 

activist Tan /uorcn ( i~ f/f-, A), \-\hn wac; given five years in prison f(lr \\'a!lting to im·c.stigate the quality or school 

buildings that C\)l!apsed during the Sichuan earthquake in 200g. Xia and Pu also represented Ai \\'eh\ci and his 

\Vii\; in the tax (,.'vas ion case brought again:,t their i,.:Ompany Beijing Fake Cultural Development, Ltd. follo\\'ing the 

arti~t's detention in 2011 

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39 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF XIAORONG LI


26342.007

Web: Free Liu Xiaobo. i\llow Him to Choose Doctors & Treatment 

Email: Free Liu Xiaobo. Allow Him to Choose Doctors & Treatment 

Extract: The Chinese gmernment must free Liu Xiaobo. allow him to reunite with his 

!amily, and ensure he immediately receives medical treatment by doctors~-and in the 

location·--<Jf his own choosing. 

(Chinese Human Rights Defenders, June 27, 2017} ·The Chinese government must free 

Liu Xiaobo unconditionally, allow him to reunite with his family, and ensure he 

immediately receives medical treatment doctors, and in the location. of his choice. 

According to Liu's lawyers. I was diagnosed with ten11inalliver 

cancer in late May. The Prison Administrative Bureau that he had 

been granted "medical parole" moved to a hospital in Shenyang on an unknown date. 

his wife, has that Uu can no longer receive surgery or chemotherapy 

treatment lt1r his cancer, which may have metastasized. CHRD urges the international 

community to offer Liu Xiaobo the best medical treatment they can provide, and to 

welcome his if they choose to leave China. The Chinese ofticials complicit in the 

medical neglect Xiaobo in Jinzhou Prison, and in his arbitrary imprisonment, must 

be held accountable. 

Liu Xiaobo, a poet and writer, was a leader in the 1989 pro-democracy movement and 

played a key role in the 2008 manifesto for democratization and human rights 

in China. The government Liu alter 1989 and then again in 2009, '""·''·'·"""·'·'·'""' 

him of"inciting subversion and sentencing him to II in prison. In 

20 I 0, the Norwegian Nobel the Nobel Peace "tor his long 

and non-violent struggle for human rights in China." The Chinese 

government did not allow him to attend the ceremony, at which he was represented by an 

empty ehair. Liu Xia has been under house arrest ever since, and is also in need of 

medical treatment for a heart condition. his detention, Liu was the editor ofthe 

online journal Democratic China. and had served as the president of the independent 

Chinese PEN. 

Depriving medical treatment to individuals in custody is a m.,·. L''f.,.:.".E''l.'.'!,l; . .l.:c'1.'J..''x .. !'cl1 .. "r' 

In 2014, the United Nations ctmcern that detained Chinese 

lawyers have been deprived care as a fhn11 of government reprisal. Failure or 

refusal to provide adequate medical care f(w detainees violates Chinese law and 

international standards. This form ofahuse has led to the death ofacthists. as seen in 

tracking cases of currently detained or imprisoned individuals who sutler from 

deteriorating health and have been deprived of adequate mt>dical treatment and denied 

release on medical grounds. There are II individuals currently on our Medical Watch 

List, including Liu Xia. We urge the Chinese government to release them and allow them 

to access medical care of their own choice. 
40 


26342.008

CHRD additionally calls on: 

1. The UN Committee against Torture and the 

right to health to detailed intbrtnation 

medical care in and detention facilities. They 

indleplendlent inv·estigatiolrtS into allegations 

and others. 

2. The UN Human Rights Council to suspend China's membership in the Council 

while the government continues to grossly violate the human of Chinese 

citizens, such as Liu Xiaobo. 

3. All like-minded governments and international that publicly claim 

to support human rights to to the government to release 

Liu Xiaobo and Liu Xia and ensure they receive medical care of 

their choice. 

CHRD is calling on the Chinese governrr1en1 to allow Liu Xiaobo to reunite with his 

and to ensure that he medical treatment by doctors, and in the location, 

of his own choice. 

Contacts: 
41 


26342.009
42 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. MARCO RUBIO, A U.S. SENATOR FROM FLORIDA; 

CHAIRMAN, CONGRESSIONAL-EXECUTIVE COMMISSION ON CHINA

JUNE 28, 2017

Good afternoon. This is a hearing of the Congressional-Executive Commission on 

China. The title of this hearing is ‘‘Gagging the Lawyers: China’s Crackdown on 

Human Rights Lawyers and Its Implications for U.S.-China Relations.’’ 

We will have one panel testifying today. The panel will feature: 

•Terence Halliday: Co-director of the Center on Law & Globalization at the 

American Bar Foundation, and Co-author of the book Criminal Defense in 

China: The Politics of Lawyers at Work; 

•Teng Biao: Chinese human rights lawyer; Visiting Scholar at the Institute for 

Advanced Study; and Co-founder of the Open Constitution Initiative and China 

Human Rights Accountability Center; 

•Xia Chongyu: Son of imprisoned human rights lawyer Xia Lin (pronounced 

SHAH LIN) and student at Liberty University; and 

•Xiaorong Li: independent scholar; formerly with the Institute for Philosophy 

& Public Policy at the University of Maryland. 

Thank you all for being here. 

Before we move to the topic at hand I want to take a moment to acknowledge 

the news this week regarding the reported transfer of 2010 Nobel Peace Prize laureate Liu Xiaobo from prison to a hospital for treatment of late-stage liver cancer. 

This should not be confused with an act of mercy on the part of the Chinese government. His eight years of imprisonment—due to his eloquent appeals for non-violent 

political reform and protection of basic rights—remain a travesty of justice and a 

stain on China’s rights record. And Dr. Liu’s medical parole is not the equivalent 

of an early release from his prison sentence or that he has the freedom to meet with 

his wife, Liu Xia, other family members and friends. I’ve urged President Trump 

to seek the humanitarian transfer of Dr. Liu and his wife to the United States to 

explore what medical options may be available. 

I’d like to briefly read a quote from an editorial that ran in the Communist-Party 

controlled Global Times. The writers gloated, ‘‘China has not collapsed as the West 

forecast in the 1980s and 1990s, but has created a global economic miracle. A group 

of pro-democracy activists and dissidents lost a bet and ruined their lives. Although 

Liu was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, he is likely to face tragedy in the end.’’ 

Any notion that Dr. Liu will receive adequate medical care under the supervision 

of his captors is absurd. I was pleased to read this morning that newly arrived U.S. 

Ambassador Terry Branstad has urged the Chinese government to allow Dr. Liu to 

seek treatment overseas. 

As the Nobel Committee noted, Dr. Liu exemplifies the ‘‘long and non-violent 

struggle for fundamental human rights in China.’’ That same spirit animates the 

work of the Chinese rights lawyers we will hear about today. 

July 9, 2017, marks the two-year anniversary of the start of what has been described as an unprecedented nationwide crackdown on human rights lawyers and 

legal advocates in China—an event that’s come to be known as the ‘‘709’’ crackdown. 

While perhaps unprecedented in scale and coordination—nearly 300 rights advocates were detained, summoned for questioning, or disappeared—the crackdown 

began much earlier. 

Xi Jinping’s rule has been marked by extensive campaigns to silence political dissent, curtail civil society, and ensure ideological loyalty to and conformity with the 

Chinese Communist Party. No sector of society is untouched—business leaders, 

bloggers and social media users, university professors, journalists and religious adherents have all been targeted. 

But China’s rights defenders and lawyers have been the ‘‘tip of the spear’’ for even 

longer—as our second witness, Dr. Teng Biao, can no doubt attest. This small, but 

tenacious group is closely linked to the growth in legal rights consciousness among 

ordinary Chinese citizens. China’s ‘‘rights defense’’ movement converged around incidents of injustice that resulted from the single-minded drive of the Chinese government and the Communist Party for rapid economic growth without political reform. 

The victims of injustice included farmers who lost land from government expropriation; urban residents forcibly evicted without fair compensation; migrant workers trying to recoup unpaid wages; teachers, laid-off workers, and army veterans 

who lost their pensions; and parents whose children were made ill from ingesting 

contaminated milk powder. The movement has expanded to support free speech, the 

pro-democracy aspirations of Hong Kongers, ethnic minority rights, and other 

issues. 

43 

Our first witness, Dr. Halliday, has conducted literally hundreds of interviews 

with these men and women—a group bound together by their shared conviction regarding the importance of protecting basic legal freedoms in a system where rule 

of law remains aspirational at best. 

Among the lawyers featured in his latest book are those whose names and stories 

have captured headlines for the last two years. Their unjust and unexpected detentions nearly two years ago was, for many, the start of a long and harrowing ordeal 

marked by months in isolation, torture, coerced ‘‘confessions’’ and other forms of 

mistreatment. Some of these lawyers, like Jiang Tianyong—whose wife I had the 

privilege of meeting earlier this year— remain in detention. Others, like Li Heping, 

are no longer in captivity, but the brutality they experienced left them visibly physically altered. Many have been disbarred and will never again practice law in China. 

Still others live under constant surveillance and harassment. 

It is tempting in the face of China’s worsening and increasingly brazen human 

rights violations to grow disheartened. Which is why I think it is equally important 

to spend some time today examining another part of this crackdown that is unprecedented—and that is the response of some of the family members of those detained. 

By their own telling, many of the wives of these rights lawyers had not previously 

been involved in their husband’s efforts to pursue justice and accountability from 

their own government. But as the present system conspired against them and their 

families, they became advocates in their own right. In case after case, these women 

took up the mantle of advocacy on behalf of their husbands. Their personal accounts 

of intimidation and harassment—of landlords refusing them housing, of children denied entry to local schools, of movement restricted and lives lived under constant 

surveillance—coupled with their compelling public defense of their husband’s innocence, has, in the words of Dr. Halliday, opened up, ‘‘new line of struggle that we 

have not seen before in China’’. 

Similar courage and boldness is on display today with the testimony of Xia 

Chongyu about his father’s plight. 

Even for those of us who hold steadfastly to the view that U.S. foreign policy must 

be infused with a principled defense of universal human rights and the promotion 

of basic freedoms, there remains the notion that change in China will ultimately 

come from within. I agree. And China’s rights defense lawyers are at the vanguard 

in pressing for systemic change, in seeking accountability and redress, and in working toward a day when China is a nation where the law is used to protect rights 

not suppress them. It is our duty to stand with them in this monumental task. 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. CHRISTOPHER SMITH, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM NEW

JERSEY; COCHAIRMAN, CONGRESSIONAL-EXECUTIVE COMMISSION ON CHINA

JUNE 28, 2017

Chinese officials repeatedly tell me I should focus more on the positive aspects 

of China and not dwell so much on the negative. 

That is an extremely difficult task when you read the horrifying and sadistic accounts of torture and enforced disappearances experienced by lawyers and rights advocates. 

It is hard to be positive when you contemplate Liu Xiaobo’s cancer diagnosis and 

the fact that China effectively silenced its most brilliant democracy advocate. 

The empty chair at Oslo speaks volumes about the Communist Party’s abiding 

fear that freedom will upend the power of the privileged few when they should be 

seeing liberty as a path to greater peace and prosperity. 

At a hearing last month in the Subcommittee on Global Human Rights in the 

House Foreign Affairs Committee, I heard testimony from the wives of five detained 

or disappeared human rights lawyers. These courageous women have become effective advocates from their husbands and for all those detained in the ‘‘709’’ crackdown. 

They described in horrifying detail the physical, mental, and psychological torture 

experienced by their husbands, including marathon interrogation sessions, sleep 

deprivation, beatings, crippling leg tortures, and prolonged submersion in water. 

Many of their husbands also were forced to take alarming quantities of drugs including tranquilizers, barbiturates, antipsychotic drugs, and other unknown substances daily. 

What they described was shocking, offensive, immoral, and inhumane. It is also 

possible that Chinese officials believe the international community will not hold 

them accountable. 

44 

After the hearing, I wrote to the heads of the American Medical Association, the 

American Psychological Association, the World Health Organization, as well as to 

Secretary of State Tillerson and Ambassador Nikki Haley. 

I have asked for condemnation of the practice of torture and medical experimentation on prisoners of conscience. I have also ask for investigations so that serious 

questions will be asked of the Chinese government. 

Finally, I have asked for accountability. I have urged Secretary Tillerson to start 

investigations under the Global Magnitsky Act, a bill that I lead on the House side 

last year, so that any Chinese government officials complicit in torture should never 

be allowed to benefit from entry to the United States or access to our 

financialsystem. 

The issues of torture and ‘‘residential surveillance in a designated location’’—effectively enforced disappearances—will be priorities of mine and of this Commission 

moving forward. I believe these are issues where diverse and multi-level coalitions 

can be built to raise issues with the Chinese government. 

I would also like to do more to prioritize the protection of human rights lawyers 

and their families. At the hearing last month I heard the phrase ‘‘The War on Law’’ 

used to describe the systematic effort to eviscerate the network of human rights 

lawyers. 

That phrase struck me because, though the number of human rights lawyers in 

China is small, what they stand for was nothing less than the rule of law for everyone—particularly those persecuted or aggrieved by the Communist Party. 

They stand for the right of everyone in China—religious believers, ethnic minority, petitioners, labor activists, or victim of corruption or a barbaric population control polices—to have a fair hearing, due process, and a justice that is not politicized. 

The Communist Party sees this as a dangerous idea. It means that they should 

be accountable to the people—to hundreds of millions of people in fact seeking redress for persecution and Party corruption. 

Xi Jinping is feted in Davos for his commitments to openness and the rule of law, 

but it is rule of law for the few and privileged and rule by law for the rest. 

The failure to implement the rule of law, to favor a type of lawlessness in the 

pursuit of keeping the Communist Party in power, has serious and lasting implications for U.S.-China relations. 

We must recognize, after the failure of two and half decades of the engagement 

policies, that China’s domestic repression drives its external aggression, its mercantilist trade policies, and its unimaginable decisions to keep propping up a murderous North Korean regime. 

I know the Chinese government wants me to focus on positive things. I think one 

positive development here is that the spouses (and families) of rights advocates and 

lawyers have given Beijing a rightly deserved headache. They have refused to be 

silent about their spouse’s detentions or disappearances and have used the Internet 

and media to get out their message. 

This trend is something new, something different, something we need to honor because they are under great pressure to be silent—through intimidation, harassment, 

and detention. 

I want to say to our witness Chongyu that we appreciate your testimony here 

today and the fact that you are speaking out on behalf of your father. We want you 

to know that this Commission is an advocate for you, your family, and your father. 

If you or your family face reprisals because of your testimony here today, the Congress will take it as a personal affront to the work of this body. 

I know your petition has gathered 94,000 signatures, please make sure that my 

name is 94,001. 

The one thing that gives me hope is that the people of China long for liberty, justice and opportunity. 

The need for principled and consistent American leadership is more important 

than ever, as China’s growing economic power, and persistent diplomatic efforts, 

have succeeded in dampening global criticism of its escalating repression and failures to adhere to universal standards. 

The United States must be a beacon of liberty and a champion of individual rights 

and freedoms. The United States must also continue to be voice for those silenced, 

jailed, or repressed in China. 

We cannot . . . will not . . . forget those in China bravely seeking liberty and 

justice and the unalienable rights we all share. Like China’s human rights lawyers—and like Liu Xiaobo—those who bravely seek peaceful change in China. 

It is their stand for liberty, human rights, and the rule of law that remain the 

best hope for a peaceful and prosperous future for the United States and China. 

45 

SUBMISSIONS FOR THE RECORD


26342.010

Prominent Lawyer Cases 

Jiang Tianyong (in police custody since November 2016, formally arrested on 

May 31, 2017), a disbarred human rights lawyer who has defended Falun Gong 

practitioners, Tibetans, and members of other groups that authorities deem to be 

politically sensitive, has been detained since November 2016, and was formally 

arrested on May 31 on charges of "subversion of state power." 1 Jiang helped to 

defend prominent rights lawyer Gao Zhisheng and legal advocate Chen 

Guangcheng, and in 2014 investigated a "black jail" where Falun Gong practitioners 

allegedly were being held. He has been detained several times since 201 I, and 

reportedly was tortured. 2 ln November 2009, Jiang testified at a hearing before the 

Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission, in which he described abuses in China's 

One-Child Policy3 

Wang Quanzhang (in police custody since July 2015, indicted in February 2017), 

a member of the Fengrui Law Firm, defended Falun Gong practitioners, human rights 

lawyers, and victims of illegal land grabs. After being detained during a trial 

reportedly for refusing a judge's command, Wang wrote a legal manual on judicial 

detention for other rights lawyers. Wang was held incommunicado for 18 months and 

indicted on subversion charges in January 2017.4 

Xie Yang (trial broadcast on TV in May, current whereabouts unknown), 

an attorney who defended rights advocates, was detained in July 2015. In 

January 2017, Xie's lawyers released a transcript in which he described 

various forms of torture he had endured while being held for six months under 

"residential surveillance at a designated location." During a court hearing on 

May 8, 2017, Xie pled guilty to charges of "inciting subversion of state 

power" and "disrupting court order," and denied that he had been tortured.5 

Xie was released on bail on May 9 before a verdict was announced. Xie's 

1 Elizabeth M. Lynch, "Codifying Illegality? The Case of Jiang Tianyong," China Law and Policy, January 20, 

2017. 

2 Chinese Human Rights Defenders, "Jiang Tianyong," op. cit. 3 Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission, "An Evaluation of30 Years of the One-Child Policy, November 10, 

20 17, https://humanrightscommission.house.gov/sites/tlhrc.house.gov/files/documents/Backup%20of%20 Il-l 0-

2009%20China%200ne%20Child%20Policy.pdf 

4 Nectar Gan, "Human Rights Lawyer Swept Up in 709 Crackdown To Face Court in Tianjin for Subversion," South 

China Morning Post, February 16,20 17; Michael Caster and Peter Dahlin, "China Should He Proud of Wang 

Quanzhang -Instead It Persecutes Him," The Guardian, September 22,2016. 5 Nectar Gan, "Chinese Rights Lawyer Pleads Guilty to Subversion," South China Morning Post, May 8, 201 7; Josh 

Chin, "Document of Torture: One Chinese Lawyer's Story from Jail," Wall Street Journal, January 20,2017. 
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defense lawyer, Chen Jiangang, was detained during the proceedings.6 Chen 

and his family were taken into custody while on vacation. His family was 

released, but Chen was forced to return home to Beijing under police escort, 

spending over 80 hours traveling by car. 

Guo Feixiong (serving a 6-year sentence), the pen name of Yang Maodong, 

a legal rights advocate, was arrested in 2013 for demonstrating against the 

censorship of a formerly progressive publication, Southern Weekend. In 2015, 

Guo was sentenced to six years in prison for "gathering a crowd to disrupt 

social order." In December 2016, Chinese authorities suspended the legal 

license of Li Jinxing, Guo's defense lawyer, for one year allegedly for 

"interfering with court proceedings."7 

• Zhou Shifcng (serving a 7-year sentence), headed the Fengrui Law Firm, at 

the center of the "709" crackdown, which had taken on many politically 

sensitive cases. In August 2016, Zhou was found guilty of "subversion of state 

power" and sentenced to seven years in prison. 8 

• Hu Shigen (serving a 7.5-year sentence), a democracy advocate and 

Christian church leader with ties to the Fengrui Law Firm, was detained in 

July 2015 and formally arrested in January 2016 on the charge of "subversion 

of state power." He was convicted in August 2016 and sentenced to sevenand-a-half years in prison. Hu had formerly served a 16-year sentence for 

spreading information about the 1989 military crackdown in Beijing.9 

Li Heping (suspended sentence), an attorney who had represented Falun 

Gong practitioners, members of unregistered Christian churches, 

environmental activists, and others, was tried for "subversion of state power." 

He provided assistance to prominent rights lawyer Gao Zhisheng and legal 

advocate Chen Guangcheng, and also was an advocate against the use of 

torture. Li was held at an unknown location beginning in July 2015 without 

access to his family or to defense lawyers. In April 2017, a Tianjin court, in a 

closed trial, sentenced Lito a three-year suspended jail sentence for 

"subversion of state power." 10 

6 "Rights Lawyers Li Heping and Xie Yang Released from Jail," China Digital Times, May 10, 2017; Tom Phillips, 

"China Puts Leading Human Rights Lawyer on Trial for Subversion," The Guardian, May 8, 2017 "UN Denounces 

China Crackdown on Lawyers, Seeks Release," Reuters, May 5, 2017. 7 Te-Ping Chen, "Chinese Human Rights Lawyer's Legal License is Suspended," Wall Street Journal, December 2, 

2016. 

8 Javier C. Hernandez, "Zhou Shifeng, Chinese Lawyer, Is Sentenced to 7 Years for Subversion," New York Times, 

August 4, 2016. 9 Javier C. Hernandez, "China Sentences Hu Shigen, Democracy Advocate, to 7 Years in Prison," New York Times, 

August 3, 2016. 10 Lucy Hornby, "China Sends Warning to Lawyers with Secret Trials," Financial Times, April 30, 2017; "The AntiTorture Work of Lawyer Li Heping That Irked the Chinese Authorities," China Change, January 26, 2017. 
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Pu Zhiqiang (suspended sentence, completed on May 4, 2017), a human 

rights lawyer and government critic, was detained in 2014, along with other 

attendees of a small gathering to mark the 251

h anniversary of the military 

crackdown of June 4, 1989. In 2015, a Beijing court handed Pu a three-year 

suspended sentence for the crimes of "inciting ethnic hatred" and "disturbing 

public order," based in part on comments that he had made online. 11 

• In August 2016, Chinese courts released three rights attorneys and activists 

from detention. Zhai Yanmin, a rights activist who worked for the Fengrui 

Law Firm, was convicted of"subversion of state power" and handed a threeyear suspended sentence. Wang Yu, a rights lawyer at the Fengrui Law Firm 

who had defended Uyghur scholar and activist Ilham Tohti, was released on 

bail in July 2016 after she gave a televised confession criticizing the law 

firm. 12 She and her husband, lawyer Bao Longjun, also released on bail, are 

reportedly held under close official monitoring in Inner Mongolia. Guo 

Hongguo, a rights activist and member of an unregistered Christian church, 

was convicted of"subversion of state power" and given a three-year 

suspended sentenceY 

In a hearing on January 29,2016, the Guangzhou Municipal Intermediate 

People's Court convicted human rights activists Tang Jingling, Yuan 

Chaoyang, and Wang Qingying of"inciting subversion of state power" and 

sentenced them to five years, three-and-a-half years, and two-and-a-half years, 

respectively. The three activists were among more than 300 signatories of 

Charter 08, a document published on December 10,2008, calling for changes 

such as an end to one-party rule, the creation of an independent legal system 

and freedom of expression. 14 

11 Tom Phillips, Scuftles Outside Beijing Court as Human Rights Lawyer Pu Zhiqiang Goes on Trial," The 

Guardian, December 21, 20 15; Didi Tang, "Chinese Rights Lawyer Pu Denies All Police Charges," Associated 

Press, December 10, 2014. 12 Wang Yu's husband and colleague, Bao Longjun, and son, Bao Zhuoxuan, also had been detained. 

ll "Bailed Chinese Human Rights Lawyers Have Yet to Regain Liberty," Radio Free Asia, August 8, 2016; Human 

Rights in China, "Profiles: Gou Hongguo, Hu Shigen, Zhai Yanmin, and Zhou Shifeng, August 5, 2016. 14 "Verdicts for Tang Jingling, Yuan Chaoyang, and Wang Qingying- The 'Three Gentlemen ofGuangzhou'," 

January 26, 2016. 
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Lawyer Xia lin Will be Sentenced on September 

22, and It Will Have Nothing to Do With the law 

Guo Yushan, September 22, 2016 

On September 22, after nearly two years in detention and a trial in August, lawyer Xia 

Lin (II~), my friend, will finally face his sentence. 

Whatever he's been charged with, it's clear to everyone that it was only because he 

defended me that he has been imprisoned, and suffered as he has to this day. 

dragged into a number of disputes because of his involvement 

in Pu Zhiqiang's case. One day in mid June, me, Xia Lin, and Kaiping C~llJfL Sf) 

were sharing drinks at Beijing Worker's Stadium, lamenting Pu's case. At a break in the 

conversation, Xia Lin suddenly said to me: "If you get sent to prison in the future, I'll be 

your lawyer. I'll fight your case publicly to the end and I'll do whatever it takes." I 

replied that, of course, if I'm thrown in jail, fight it by all means, fight it as you see fit, 

and you don't have to worry about the consequences for me. That we concluded, with 

Kaiping as witness, raising our hands in toast and draining our cups. 

Who'd have thought that the day would come so soon? Three months after the drinks at 

Worker's Stadium, both Kaiping and I were taken into custody [in October 2014]. Xia 
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Lin indeed defended me. A month later, he was also detained. In the time that followed I 

was bounced between three detention centers, while he was kept in the Beijing First 

Detention Center. A year later I was released on bail - but they kept him behind bars 

because he refused to supply a confession. Another year passed, and only now is he 

going to meet a verdict. 

We've all paid the price we expected. 

The price is bound to be exacted, given that we've chosen our stance toward this country 

since when we were young. Xia Lin made his choice in the flush of his youth, as part of 

the 1989 generation, choosing to go to Tiananmen Square, wearying his spirit in the 

struggle with his peers to improve this country. He again made his choice when he was a 

student at the Southwest University of Political Science and Law (i§i$iil&)!;~ll5/;), where 

he made an open vow never to be a lackey or collaborator with evil. 

This he achieved. He never wavered from his course for 27 years. From Guizhou to 

Beijing, from a commercial lawyer to a human rights lawyer: the road oflife he took 

became rockier and rockier, but more and more soul stirring. 

As for the price of a life to be paid- Xia Lin, like me, is ready for it. He's much more 

awake than I to the reality of how the system reacts, and its brutality. 

Our lives have been interwoven together, as if by fate, from our first meeting in Mao 

Haojian's (~;til~) course on modern Chinese history at Peking University. In 2004 

after fellow students and I were surrounded on the Jingyuan Lawn on campus, where we 

protested [over the death of a female student], he came with law books and an attorney 

contract, walking around the lawn, always within reach. In 2008 during the Deng Yujiao 

case (X~Jilo'i'~), he was in Badong County, Hubei, and I rushed there from Beijing to be 

a help to him. 

In 2012, after I drove Chen Guangcheng to the American Embassy. Xia Lin sat in my 

study and combed through all the possible charges the authorities could resort to for 

reprisal, from "subversion of state power" to "illegal business operations." He analyzed 

and whittled through them one by one. Two years later, when I found myself in prison, 

all that probing became precious legal experience. 

We all know the fates we'll come to assume in history. Both Xia Lin and myself, and so, 

so many of our colleagues, are all fated to be the stepping stones, the paving stones, for 

the age of the future. Accepting this humble place in history is our honor. 

As for what lays ahead, we've not changed what has animated us from the beginning, 

and we won't. 

Whether we're slandered or given heavy sentences - what surprise will it be in today's 

China? When I was first arrested, I repeated to myself, and to the authorities, over and 

over again: If I were to be sentenced, one day will be the same as a decade. With Xia Lin, 

who is so proud, it's the same. 

The September 22 sentence might be, say, 11 years imprisonment, or it might be 2 years, 

but however many years it is, it will have had nothing to do with the law. This is our fate. 

We have no choice but to accept it. 
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Such is our world - so top up the goblet. On September 22 I'll be outside the court with 

wine, waiting for the outcome. But for Xia Lin, for myself, for the judge Yi Daqing (~ ;k. 

1}1:), for the 101 Special Investigation Team assigned to my and Xia Lin's case, this isn't 

the conclusion. It's just the beginning. 
51 

‘‘GAGGING THE LAWYERS: CHINA’S CRACKDOWN ON HUMAN RIGHTS

LAWYERS AND IMPLICATIONS FOR U.S.-CHINA RELATIONS’’ 

JUNE 28, 2017

Witness Biographies 

Terence Halliday, Co-Director of the Center on Law and 

Globalization and Research Professor at the American Bar 

Foundation 

Terence Halliday is Co-Director, Center on Law and 

Globalization, and Research Professor, American Bar Foundation; 

Honorary Professor, School of Regulation and Global Governance, 

Australian National University; and Adjunct Professor of Sociology, 

Northwestern University. His most recent books are Criminal Justice in China (2016) and Global Lawmakers: How International Organizations Shape World Markets (2017). He has consulted with 

the World Bank and China’s State Council Office on Restructuring 

the Economic System and has written extensively on China’s corporate bankruptcy law. He leads a research team on domestic and 

international mobilization for basic legal freedoms in China. 

Dr. Teng Biao, Chinese Human Rights Lawyer, Visiting 

Scholar at the Institute for Advanced Study, Co-Founder of 

the Open Constitution Initiative and the China Human 

Rights Accountability Center 

Dr. Teng Biao is a well-known human rights lawyer, a visiting 

scholar at the Institute for Advanced Study, and co-founder of both 

the Open Constitution Initiative and China Human Rights Accountability Center. Dr. Teng holds a Ph.D. from Peking University 

Law School and has been a visiting scholar at Yale Law School. His 

research interests are in human rights, judicial systems, constitutionalism, and social movements. As a human rights lawyer, Dr. 

Teng is a promoter of the Rights Defense Movement and a coinitiator of the New Citizens’ Movement in China. In 2003, he was 

one of the ‘‘Three Doctors of Law’’ who submitted a petition to the 

National People’s Congress about the unconstitutional detentions of 

internal migrants. Since then, Dr. Teng has provided counsel in numerous other human rights cases, including those of Chen 

Guangcheng, rights defender Hu Jia, and many other religious 

freedom and death penalty cases. 

Xia Chongyu, Son of imprisoned human rights lawyer Xia 

Lin and Student at Liberty University 

Xia Chongyu is a student at Liberty University. As of June 2017, 

a petition he initiated urging the Chinese government to release 

his father, had generated more than 90,000 signatures. His father, 

Xia Lin, is a human rights lawyer with more than 20 years’ experience working on public interest and politically sensitive cases. His 

clients have included prominent artist Ai Weiwei; public interest 

lawyer Pu Zhiqiang; and Guo Yushan, a think tank founder who 

helped Chen Guangcheng escape to the United States Embassy 

Beijing, among others. The Beijing No. 2 Intermediate People’s 

Court convicted Xia of ‘‘fraud’’ in September 2016 and sentenced 

him to 12 years in prison. The sentence was reduced to 10 years 

on appeal in April 2017. 

52 

Xiaorong Li, Independent scholar and former researcher 

at the Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy at the University of Maryland 

Xiaorong Li is an independent scholar and former researcher at 

the Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy at the University of 

Maryland focusing on ethics and theories of human rights and democracy, with a regional focus on Asia/China. She is the author of 

the book Ethics, Human Rights, and Culture and has written numerous articles on human rights, international justice, and women’s rights, including on China’s horrific population control policies. 

Her writing has been published in the Yale Journal of Law & Feminism and NYR Daily, the blog of The New York Review of Books. 

She is also one of the founding members of several non-government 

human rights organizations. 

Æ