"Release the Worker Representatives!"/Chinese Worker Rights Activists Tried on "Subversion" Charges

Posted to the IUF website 16-Jan-2003

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Two leaders of mass worker protests in the northeastern Chinese industrial city of Liaoyang were tried on January 15 for the crime of "subversion", which can carry the death penalty. Two other workers leaders have been detained and their rights consistently violated since police intervened to squash the protests in March last year. At their peak, the Liaoyang demonstrations involved tens of thousands of workers. The banners carried by the workers tell the whole story: "Release the worker representatives!" and "Being owed money is not a crime".

Thousands of laid-off former employees of the Liaoyang Ferroalloy Factory held public demonstrations last spring to protest unresolved grievances dating back to 1995, when management of the plant (which once had 12,000 employees) began issuing phoney profit reports to justify bonuses. At the same time, the company ceased paying employee pension and medical benefits. In 2000, workers at the plant began a series of public protests against unpaid wages, while management systematically looted and embezzled the plant's resources. The plant was officially declared bankrupt the following year. In March 2002, Ferroalloy worker leaders were detained as police were deployed around the factory during the bankruptcy "negotiations". Ferroalloy workers, joined by workers from other manufacturing plants, took to the streets when the local Communist party leader declared on television that there were no unemployed in Liaoyang. Workers continued to demonstrate � always peacefully � as more leaders were arrested.

Four arrested leaders of the protests initially faced charges of illegal assembly: Yao Fuxin, Xiao Yunliang, Pang Qingxiang and Wang Zhaoming. On January 15, however, Yao Fuxin and Xiao Yunliang were tried on the much more serious charge of "subversion". Their sentence has not yet been made public, nor have the precise charges against Pang and Wang.

Repression has so far failed to halt the Liaoyang workers from showing solidarity with their persecuted colleagues. The Hong-Kong based China Labour Bulletin (CLB) reported on January 15 that

A worker from Liaoyang who lives near the court told CLB that police cars blocked all vehicle and pedestrian traffic this morning in front of the court where the trial was taking place. Another worker from the Liaoyang Ferroalloy Factory told CLB late today that the leaders of the workers who were continuing the struggle and seeking the release of Yao and the other three leaders of the March protests, Xiao Yunliang, Wang Zhaoming and Pang Qingxiang, had their telephone lines cut today. And the families of all these leaders had police officers with them in their homes all day long. Wang, who disappeared on Dec. 31, is now back at home but has been warned not to discuss the trial or communicate with outsiders.

Persecution of the four workers' leaders has been supported by the official All-China Federation of Trade Unions (ACFTU). ACFTU Deputy Chairman and First Secretary Zhang Junjiu told the recent Communist Party Congress that Yao Fuxin had "carried out car bombings", despite the fact that neither the Liaoyang city authorities nor the Liaoyang Public Security bureau have accused any of the protestors of violent activity. In a January 10 letter to ACFTU Chairman Wang Zhagou, ICFTU General Secretary Guy Ryder wrote that "In last June's elections to the International Labour organization's Governing Body, the ACFTU candidate was elected as a Deputy Member of the ILO's Workers' Group. Yet your organization, when faced with Chinese workers � its own members even � struggling to win their legal rights, not only refuses to speak out on their behalf and protect persecuted organizers, but works against them."

The struggle continues; international pressure is needed to press the Chinese authorities to cease all persecution and harassment of the Liaoyang workers' leaders. Please take the time to send a message; the message below can serve as a model. Kindly send copies to the secretariat of any messages you might send. We thank you in advance for your solidarity and support.

Regular updates on the situation of the Liaoyang Four and other independent trade union and worker rights activists in China can be found on the China Labour Bulletin web site.

To read the IUF "Viewpoint" on the ACFTU's election to the ILO Governing Body as a member of the Workers Group, click here.

Sample Message to the Government of China

Mr. Jiang Zemin
President of the People's Republic of China Beijingshi
c/o Ministry of Foreign Affairs
People's Republic of China
Fax: + 86 10-65 96 11 09

Mr. President,

I write to express my deep concern about the January 15 trial in Liaoyang of Yao Fuxin and Xiao Yunliang on charges of "subversion". The two, along with Pang Qingxiang and Wang Zhaoming, were arrested following mass demonstrations by workers protesting corruption by factory managers and arrears of wages, pension and unemployment payments. No evidence of violence has been produced by local government and police authorities; the men are in fact guilty only of seeking to exercise democratic and trade union rights guaranteed by international covenants and Conventions of the ILO.

We therefore call upon you to drop all charges and convictions against the four men and to cease all intimidation and harasment of workers and their families involved in the Liaoyang protests.

Sincerely,