{"id":4722,"date":"2018-09-21T11:14:31","date_gmt":"2018-09-21T02:14:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hrn.or.jp\/eng\/?p=4722"},"modified":"2023-10-25T09:42:19","modified_gmt":"2023-10-25T00:42:19","slug":"hrc39-china-lawyers-oral-statement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hrn.or.jp\/eng\/news\/2018\/09\/21\/hrc39-china-lawyers-oral-statement\/","title":{"rendered":"<i>39th HRC Session<\/i>: Oral Statement on the Harassment of Human Rights Lawyers and Activists in China"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>On 18 September\u00a02018, Human Rights Now gave an oral statement on the Harassment of Human Rights Lawyers and Activists in China at the 39<sup>th<\/sup>\u00a0Session of the Human Rights Council in Geneva.<\/p>\n<p>Human rights lawyers, legal assistants, and activists in China continue to face harassment and interference. In the statement we called on the Chinese government to <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">end its crackdown and harassment of\u00a0 human rights lawyers by, among other actions, releasing arbitrarily detained lawyers and activists, revoking their convictions, reversing the revocation of lawyer and law firm licenses, and repealing the regulations permitting them.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>The video and the full text of the statement can be accessed below.<\/p>\n<p>The full statement of the statement can be downloaded\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/hrn.or.jp\/eng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/HRC39_China_Lawyers-1.pdf\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<div style=\"display: block; position: relative; max-width: 480px; max-height: 270px;\">\n<div style=\"padding-top: 56.25%;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" style=\"width: 100%; height: 100%; position: absolute; top: 0px; bottom: 0px; right: 0px; left: 0px;\" src=\"\/\/www.un.org\/webcast\/1362235914001\/B1J3DDQJf_default\/index.html?videoId=5836772138001#t=17m31s\" width=\"300\" height=\"150\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"><span data-mce-type=\"bookmark\" style=\"display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;\" class=\"mce_SELRES_start\">\ufeff<\/span><span data-mce-type=\"bookmark\" style=\"display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;\" class=\"mce_SELRES_start\">\ufeff<\/span><span data-mce-type=\"bookmark\" style=\"display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;\" class=\"mce_SELRES_start\">\ufeff<\/span><\/iframe><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<hr \/>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Thank you, Mr. President.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The ongoing interference and harassment of human rights lawyers and activists in China since 9 July 2015 has affected over 300 human rights lawyers, legal assistants, and activists. On 9 July 2018 it was reported that 14 lawyers have been sentenced, 5 of which are serving their sentence; 1 lawyer remains under residential surveillance; 1 lawyer awaits trial; 25 have had their bail conditions lifted, 11 of which are lawyers; 43 are forbidden to leave the country; and 265 were temporarily detained, forcibly questioned, or summoned.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">From October 2017 to July 2018, the government reportedly revoked or invalidated the licenses of at least 16 human rights lawyers and 3 law firms. Two regulations were involved, \u201cMeasures on the Administration of Law Firms\u201d and \u201cMeasures on the Administration of Lawyers\u2019 Practice\u201d, which allow sanctions based on firms\u2019 political affiliation and lawyers\u2019 speech, respectively. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This situation violates lawyers\u2019 rights to freedom of expression and association guaranteed by UDHR Article 19 and the Constitution of the People\u2019s Republic of China Article 35; and it conflicts with the UN Basic Principles on the Role of Lawyers Article 16, which requires governments to ensure lawyers can perform their duties without interference, travel restrictions, or threats of prosecution for their work. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Mr. President,<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Human Rights Now urges the Chinese government to end its crackdown and harassment of rights lawyers by, among other actions, releasing arbitrarily detained lawyers and activists, revoking their convictions, reversing the revocation of lawyer and law firm licenses, and repealing the regulations permitting them. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Thank you.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On 18 September\u00a02018, Human Rights Now gave an oral statement on the Harassment of Human Rights Lawyers and Activists in China at the 39th\u00a0Session of the Human Rights Council in Geneva. Human rights lawyers, legal assistants, and activists in China continue to face harassment and interference. In the statement we called on the Chinese government to end its crackdown and harassment of\u00a0 human rights lawyers by, among other actions, releasing arbitrarily detained lawyers and activists, revoking their convictions, reversing the revocation of lawyer and law firm licenses, and repealing the regulations permitting them. The video and the full text of the statement can be accessed below. The full statement of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[139,104,106,135],"countries":[252],"class_list":["post-4722","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-statement","tag-civil-and-political-rights","tag-criminal-justice-arbitrary-detention-and-torture","tag-freedom-of-assembly","tag-un-activity","countries-china"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hrn.or.jp\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4722","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hrn.or.jp\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hrn.or.jp\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hrn.or.jp\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hrn.or.jp\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4722"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/hrn.or.jp\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4722\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4732,"href":"https:\/\/hrn.or.jp\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4722\/revisions\/4732"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hrn.or.jp\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4722"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hrn.or.jp\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4722"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hrn.or.jp\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4722"},{"taxonomy":"countries","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hrn.or.jp\/eng\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/countries?post=4722"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}