(TibetanReview.net, Jul13, 2018) – Following three years of investigation and still without a shred of evidence, China has on Jul 11 jailed democracy campaigner Qin Yongmin to a 13-year jail sentence for “subversion of state power”. Mr Qin Yongmin, 64, has already spent a total of 22 years behind bars, reported bbc.com Jul 11.
Qin, one of China’s highest-profile democracy campaigners, was reported to have stayed silent throughout his trial. The guilty verdict was reported to have been confirmed online by the Wuhan City Intermediate People’s Court, in central China.
“Authorities have been unable to build a case against him despite three years of investigation,” Frances Eve, a researcher at the NGO Chinese Human Rights Defenders, was quoted as saying. She has said Qin had been “prosecuted for his belief in a democratic China as well as his actions in advocating for human rights”.
Qin, a co-founder of the China Democracy Party, was given a 12-year prison term in 1998 after he tried to register it officially. He was reported to be leading a pro-democracy group called China Human Rights Watch when he was arrested in Jan 2015.
The guilty verdict and jail sentence against Qin came a day after Liu Xia, the widow of the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize winner Liu Xiaobo, left Beijing for Germany for medical treatment after years of illegal detention by China.
