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Freedom of expression
Petitioner Sun Fawu of ShandongPosted by Alice Xin Liu on Monday, April 13, 2009 at 6:00 PM
The Sun Dongdong affair, which involved the PKU professor declaring in China Newsweek that 99% of petitioners are insane, has put the topic of petitioners and mental hospitals in the news once more. This video from iFeng.com, taken from Phoenix TV's Social Watch ("社会能见度") program, tells the story of a petitioner named Sun Fawu (孙法武), who was taken to a mental hospital and kept there. In the first video, his wife Zhang Xuefang (张学芳) gives an interview. Transcript below (the transcript is first because the video, which follows, auto-plays):
On the iFeng video site (Chinese) is the rest of program on Sun Fawu - there are six videos in total. Interviews with Sun Fawu and his stay at the mental hospital follow, as well as other cases, such as that of Shi Hengsheng, an 84-year-old man who has been in the same asylum, also for petitioning, for two years. Shi recorded on a cigarette box the names of 18 people who was taken there, and told Sun's wife to go to Beijing with the box. Links and Sources
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Comments on Petitioner Sun Fawu of Shandong
Hi Alice
The embedded link to the archived posts on Sun Dongdong doesnt appear to be working
Dear Chinawatcher:
Sorry about that link problem. I've fixed it!
Not to worry. This kind of thing will soon be all in the past because the govt has just announced it's going to sort out human rights issues. It only took 16 years to come up with an action plan in response to UN condemnation, so I'm sure it won't take more than twenty years or so for Sun Fawu and fellow petitioners to have their voices heard. link
More on this I hope Jeremy.