Man sentenced for committing non-existent crime

Defaming the government may sound like a criminal offense, but it isn’t. Still, that didn’t stop the Chinese government from arresting someone for committing this crime that doesn’t exist. How could such a thing happen?

Wu Baoquan, a man from China’s Shandong Province is a silent hero in his own particular way. As a favor to a farmer friend from Erdos, Inner Mongolia, he began protests over the government’s failure to keep its word about land compensation. Many farmers had been promised farming facilities as reimbursement for government seizure of land. Wu publicized the story via the most powerful weapon of speech in China, the Internet.

Farmers dared to publicly protest and were treated brutally by the police. At that time, Wu was “detained” by authorities for ten days. The moment he was released, he continued his relentless campaign, and researched the issue and posted his findings and opinions online. He was arrested again and sentenced to two years in jail.

“The crime of ‘defaming the government’, is a creation by a local court,” said He Bing, a professor at the China University of Political Science and Law.

Though this may be, the Chinese government does not appear to be very imaginative when it comes to dealing with those whose actions they deem as “subversive.” Some three years ago, Zhang Jianhong, the former editor of a Chinese website named “Aegean Sea,” was given a six year prison term for writing articles which “defamed the government.”

It is unlikely that the fact that the law does not technically exist is much comfort to Wu and his ilk.


/Weird Asia News/