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Verdict on outspoken Tibet supporter a "show trial", says global right group Mettere in piedi processi farsa di dissidenti è del tutto in contrasto con l'auto-proclamata agenda riformista di Xi Dharamshala: The US based rights group Human Rights Watch has called the four year sentence upon prominent Chinese activist and outspoken critic of China's Tibet policy Xu Xhiyong "a pretext to chill popular protests against corruption." News of the trial has been censored, as has reporting by foreign media on how relatives of top leaders keep offshore accounts to hold unexplained wealth, said Human Rights Watch in a statement. Foreign journalists covering the trial outside the court last week were manhandled by Chinese policemen in plain clothes. Brad Adams, Asia Director for the right group, said the courts "harsh" verdict for a "moderate critic" reflects how little tolerance there is towards dissent in China today. “Xi Jinping has made fighting corruption the linchpin of his presidency, but when an average citizen takes up the same cause, he is sent to prison. This hypocrisy makes a mockery of the president’s anti-corruption campaign.” The HRW also said the new Chinese leadership under Xi seems more interested in consolidating power instead of ‘putting power’ within a ‘cage of regulations’, as Xi has promised. “Staging show trials of critics is wholly at odds with Xi’s self-proclaimed reformist agenda.” Xu, a lecturer of law at a Beijing university, was convicted for “gathering a crowd to disrupt order in a public place,” and sentenced to four years’ imprisonment. Only two of Xu's family members—his wife and his older sister—were allowed to attend the trial, which took place at the Beijing Municipal No. 1 Intermediate People’s Court, the same court that tried Nobel Peace Laureate Liu Xiaobo in December 2009. Xu’s two lawyers, Zhang Qingfang and Yang Jinzhu, told Human Rights in China (HRIC) that they and Xu remained silent during most of the court hearing to protest the “unjust nature” of the trial. In the afternoon, when Xu began delivering his final statement, “For Freedom, Justice, and Love,” the court interrupted him and announced the conclusion of the trial. During the hearing, the prosecutor reportedly requested a heavy punishment for Xu. In an Opinion piece titled “Tibet Is Burning” in the New York Times in December 2012, Xu described his attempts to visit the family of a Tibetan self-immolation protestor named Nangdrol, in order to pay his respects. An excerpt from Xu’s article read, “I am sorry we Han Chinese have been silent as Nangdrol and his fellow Tibetans are dying for freedom. We are victims ourselves, living in estrangement, infighting, hatred and destruction."
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