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Death of Li Wangyang

Li Wangyang
李旺阳
Slender-looking oriental man with no front teeth, wearing a white shirt and looking slightly above the camera
Still from a TV interview of Li Wangyang in June 2012
Born (1950-11-12)12 November 1950
Hunan, China
Died 6 June 2012(2012-06-06) (aged 61)
Shaoyang, Hunan, PRC
Nationality Chinese
Occupation glass worker; political activist

Li Wangyang (Chinese: 李旺阳, 12 November 1950 – 6 June 2012) was a Chinese dissident labor rights activist, member of the Workers Autonomous Federation and chairman of the Shaoyang WAF branch. Following his role in the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989, he served twenty-one years in prison on charges of counterrevolutionary propaganda, incitement, and subversion. Of all Chinese pro-democracy activists from 1989, Li has spent the longest time in prison. On 6 June 2012, one year after his release from prison, and a few days after a television interview in which he continued to call for vindication of the Tiananmen Square protests, Li was found hanged in a hospital room. Shaoyang city authorities initially claimed suicide was the cause of death, but it was revised to 'accidental death' after the autopsy.

Following a protest march attended by up to 25,000 people, Pan Democrats and senior establishment figures in Hong Kong publicly commented on the suspicious nature of the death, and said they had escalated the demands of citizens to politicians or "relevant departments" at national level for an independent investigation. The uproar in Hong Kong is said by commentators have put pressure on mainland authorities to order a criminal investigation so as not to overshadow the impending visit of president Hu Jintao for the 15th anniversary celebrations of the handover of Hong Kong.

A worker in a glass factory, Li Wangyang set up a labour union under inspiration of the Democracy Wall in 1983. In 1989, China saw mass pro-democracy protests throughout the country, with the largest protests in Tiananmen Square, Beijing. After hundreds died when the People's Liberation Army suppressed the protests on 4 June, Li pasted a poster on a Shaoyang traffic sign urging a general strike in support of the protests. Two days later, Li organized a memorial for the victims.

As a result of his actions, Li was jailed on 9 June for "counterrevolutionary propaganda and incitement". He was sentenced to ten years of imprisonment, but his sentence was increased to thirteen years when he appealed to the court. He was also sentenced to hard labour. As his health deteriorated, he was granted medical parole in June 1996, but the authorities cancelled his release after Deng Xiaoping died in 1997, fearing calls for the other responsible officials to be held accounted for the 4 June Massacre. In June 2000 Li was released again for reasons of poor health.Human Rights in China (HRIC) alleged that Li was tortured while in custody, resulting in his losing both his sight and hearing. Li himself said in his last interview that the only explanation for his becoming blind was through nerve damage caused by being repeatedly beaten about the head.


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