Nobel winner refuses Chinese bargain; The authorities have offered Liu Xiaobo freedom in exile in return for a confession, Jane Macartney writes

Nobel winner refuses Chinese bargain;
The authorities have offered Liu Xiaobo freedom in exile in return for a confession, Jane Macartney writes

BYLINE: Jane Macartney

SECTION: NEWS; Pg. 3

LENGTH: 710 words

The imprisoned Nobel Peace Prize winner, Liu Xiaobo, has rejected a proposal from the Chinese authorities to be freed and sent into exile in return for a signed confession of guilt.

China offered the bargain in an attempt to rid itself of the embarrassment of holding a Nobel prize-winner in jail but Mr Liu refused to sign, said a source in Beijing close to the United Front Work Department, which is responsible for relations with non-Communist members and organisations. Mr Liu’s award has sparked a diplomatic row, with China boycotting next month’s Nobel Peace Prize ceremony in protest and Russia following suit.

Mr Liu, 54, the first Chinese winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, is serving the second year of an 11-year sentence for subversion in a prison in the gritty northeastern city of Jinzhou, in his home province of Liaoning. He shares a cell with five common criminals.

His family is believed to have had no contact with him since his wife, Liu Xia, was allowed to see him for her regular monthly visit two days after the announcement on October 8 that he had won the award. She is under effective house arrest at the couple’s Beijing home and has not communicated with any friends since October 20.

One of Mr Liu’s defence lawyers, Shang Baojun, was unable to confirm the offer of a bargain to Mr Liu, but said that before his trial they had discussed the possibility of deportation – a solution China has used in the past to get rid of several of its most prominent dissidents. The usual procedure is to announce their release on medical parole and then immediately to send them into exile. Thus they are effectively neutralised and unable to play any real role in Chinese politics.

Mr Shang told The Times: “Liu Xiaobo has made it very clear he will not accept a conditional release and he will never leave the country.” He has also refused to apply for medical parole.

Among the most prominent dissidents to have been sent into exile is Wei Jingsheng, regarded as the father of China’s modern movement for democracy after he posted an essay on a wall in Beijing in 1979 calling for what he called China’s “Fifth Modernisation”.

He was sentenced to 15 years in jail, released in 1993, re-arrested the next year and banished to the United States in 1997.

Wang Dan, the student leader, was exiled to the US in 1998. He served four years after the demonstrations in 1989 that led to the massacre in Tiananmen Square, and was sentenced to 11 years in 1996. Others, such as Chen Ziming, who was jailed for 13 years after the student protests in 1989, have refused to go into exile and have chosen to serve their full sentence and to stay in China.

Furious at the award of the Nobel prize to a convicted criminal, China has placed unprecedented pressure on other countries not to send representatives to the ceremony in Oslo on December 10. As well as Russia, Kazakhstan has also refused to attend.

The authorities have prevented dozens of people on a list of invitees issued by the laureate’s wife – and several of their relatives – from leaving China lest they attend the ceremony to celebrate on behalf of Mr Liu.

As many as 100 people in China are under house arrest or round-the-clock surveillance for voicing support for Mr Liu or because they signed the Charter 08 document that he co-wrote, which demanded greater democratic rights and freedom of expression. Mr Liu was arrested hours before the Charter was published online.

Official invitations to attend the awards ceremony have been sent to only two people in China, who it was thought would not be prevented from leaving the country.

One is Ai Weiwei, the outspoken activist and artist, who last month filled the Tate Modern Turbine Gallery with his exhibition of millions of ceramic painted pumpkin seeds. He, however, has another engagement, but might not have been allowed to leave in any case after police stopped him going to Shanghai this month. The other, Hou Meixin, the editor, has already been prevented from leaving China.

The only other Chinese national who has braved the anger of the ruling Communist Party by saying that she hopes to attend is Dai Qing, the environmental activist. She is currently in Canada on a speaking tour and risks being refused permission to return to her homeland.