Communist
Sohu and Weibo website said: human rights workers Zhao Wei moved to Mars.
The
mystery surrounding the fate of a young Chinese activist entangled in a major
human rights crackdown has grown after her husband was unable to locate her
despite police claims she had been freed from detention. Zhao Wei, a
24-year-old legal assistant, was taken into secret detention in July 2015 at
the start of a government offensive against human rights lawyers. On 7 July
this year police said Zhao, an employee of the prominent human rights lawyer Li
Heping, who was also detained last year but remains in custody, had been
released on bail as a result of her “confession” to unnamed offences. Speaking
to Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post this week from an unknown location Zhao
claimed she had returned to her family home in Henan province and “was staying
with her parents”. However, when Zhao’s husband visited that home in the city
of Jiyuan this week he found the two-storey building deserted. “The doors and windows were all closed,” You
Minglei told the Guardian on Friday. “I knocked for quite some time but there
was nobody there.” A neighbor said the family had not been home for “a while”.
While at the address, You said he had seen a vehicle with a Beijing number
plate parked nearby as well as a surveillance camera that had been positioned
at the entrance to the narrow street. You voiced doubts over the “interview”
that his wife – who he met while she was a student activist – had given to the
South China Morning Post in which she claimed she regretted her civil rights
work. “I have come to realize that I have taken the wrong path,” the newspaper,
which did not say how the interview was set up or conducted, quoted Zhao as
saying. “I repent for what I did. I’m now a brand new person.” You said: “I
believe that Zhao Wei does not have a mobile phone or a computer with her and
she would not have the contact number for the South China Morning Post.” “I
think somebody asked her to do this and to say those things. Otherwise it
doesn’t make sense,” he added. “I still believe the government is controlling
everything behind the scenes.” William Nee, a Hong Kong-based activist for
Amnesty International who is tracking the case, said it was hard to be certain
what had happened to Zhao Wei. However, Nee said authorities appeared to be
“using many of the same abusive tactics that they have used in other cases in
order to silence [critics] such as releasing people into fake freedom ... and
harassing and controlling family members.” Nee said he was unconvinced by
Zhao’s online posts on Weibo, China’s Twitter, in which she claimed to regret
her actions. “It seems highly likely that her Sohu and Weibo comments are
either being written under coercion or are scripted by the authorities. To some
extent, this is the social media version of the notorious forced TV
confession,” he said. Public security
authorities have not responded to inquiries about Zhao Wei’s whereabouts. Calls
to Zhao’s mother’s phone went unanswered on Friday.
