Chinese authorities have sentenced two elderly women to a
year of “re-education” through labor because they repeatedly sought permits to
protest in one of the official Olympic protest sites—areas that Chinese authorities
designated as the only places where protests were allowed during the Olympic
games, but which have yet to see a single protest.
The women, Wu Dianyuan and Wang Xiuying, are 77 and 79. They
went to the police five times seeking permits to protest inadequate
compensation after their Beijing
homes were demolished for a redevelopment project. Instead of being given a new
home in the new development, as the women thought would happen, they were moved
to a dilapidated apartment outside the city. Although the New York Times did not mention whether the redevelopment was linked to the Olympics, it's possible that it was part of the Chinese government's Beijing makeover in preparation for the games.
Wu’s son, who says that his mother is nearly blind, has
worked hard to seek justice for his mother and her friend, and he is outraged
that two women in their 70s would be sentenced to re-education, which often
involves hard labor in agriculture or factories and forced confessions. Although
the women were allowed to return to their homes, officials said that they could
be whisked off to a re-education center at any time. Re-education sentences are
handed out without trials or means of appeals.
Such a sentence is perhaps one of the lighter punishments
for seeking an Olympic protest permit: some of the applicants have disappeared.
Photo: A Chinese labor camp (New York Times)
