Endangered Scholars Worldwide

The information in this quarterly print report is current as of August 28, 2017. The situation of scholars and students around the world changes on a daily basis. For the most up-to-date information and ways in which you can be involved in calling for the freedom of endangered scholars and students, please visit us online at www.endangeredscholarsworldwide.net or follow us at www.facebook.com/endangeredscholars. In these pages we introduce new cases that have come to our attention over the past three months and provide basic information about continuing cases—a description of charges and potential or actual reported sentences. If you are aware of a scholar or student whose case you believe we should investigate, please contact us at esw@newschool.edu.

ENDANGERED SCHOLARS WORLDWIDE REMEMBERS LIU XIAOBO

On July 13, 2017, Chinese Nobel peace laureate and Social Research author liu xiaobo died in custody at age 61. His death was confirmed by Chinese authorities in Shenyang province two weeks after officials announced he was being moved to a hospital for treatment. Liu was jailed in response to his call for peaceful reform, which spurred the Norwegian Nobel committee to honor him with its peace prize in 2010 and propelled him to international renown. But his first nomination had come two decades earlier, following the Tiananmen Square prodemocracy protests of 1989, in which Liu played a crucial role, first as one of the prominent "four gentlemen" who launched a hunger strike in support of the students, then by helping to broker a peaceful exit from the square for the remaining demonstrators amid the brutal crackdown. These events were the turning point in Liu's life. Though he was a visiting professor at Columbia University in New York by the time the prodemocracy movement started, he went home despite the risks. The decision brought him jail and an end to his career as a brilliant young literary professor. In 2008, along with other dissidents, he drafted Charter 08, a document that called on the Chinese state to change its character and abandon one-party rule. Soon after he was tried for subversion. He was convicted in 2009 for writing seven sentences, a total of 224 Chinese characters, and sentenced to 11 years imprisonment.

"A calm and steady mind can look at a steel gate and see a road to freedom," Liu wrote of life as a prisoner. He insisted that love could dissipate hate and that progress would be made. No Enemies, No Hatred, a selection of his essays and poems, was published in English 2013.

Endangered Scholars Worldwide holds the Chinese government responsible for Liu's death. It imprisoned him unjustly and withheld proper medical treatment until his cancer was too advanced to treat, only then releasing him on medical parole. At the end, it spurned international appeals to allow him to go abroad for treatment. We join with many others around the world who mourn his death and continue to work for the universal upholding of the values and freedoms he lived for. Liu Xiaobo's life and death should serve as a poignant reminder that freedom has a price.

NEW AND CONTINUING CASES

BAHRAIN

Scholars and Researchers: abdul-jalil al-singace, head of the department of engineering at the University of Bahrain, has been in Jau prison since 2011. At that time, he was sentenced to life imprisonment for allegedly "plotting to overthrow the government" during the Arab Spring protests demanding greater democracy. Al-Singace, a polio victim who can only stand on one leg, was nevertheless tortured at the time of his detention by beatings, sexual assault, and being forced to stand upright for long periods despite his disability. The professor of engineering at the University of Bahrain was also a Draper Hills Fellow at Stanford University's Center on Democracy in Development and the Rule of Law. He has long campaigned for political reform and an end to torture, writing on these and other subjects on his blog (in Arabic), Al-Faseela (The Date Sapling).

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Students who remain in prison include ahmed al arab...