The Chinese activist was sentenced in December 2015 to six years in prison for "disturbing social order”. He had already spent time in jail for membership of democratic movement. The hunger strike was launched to protest torture and humiliating treatment for political prisoners in Chinese prisons. He has lost a third of his weight.
Beijing (AsiaNews) - The well-known Chinese dissident Guo Feixiong has lost a third of his weight after 40 days in prison without food. The activist launched a hunger strike to protest against torture and humiliating treatment for political prisoners in Chinese prisons. The authorities have threatened his closest relatives: if they speak of his conditions they will never be allowed to see him again.
In a document delivered to his lawyer, Guo wrote that he had decided refuse food after he was forced to submit to having his head shaved and a rectal exam by prison guards, which was also filmed. In addition, the guards ordered him to "curl up like a bug" in front of each of them, at every opportunity. In the text, the dissident calls on President Xi Jinping to reform the Constitution, abolish torture in prisons and improve the situation of political prisoners.
Guo, also known as Yang Maodong, was arrested in September 2006 on charges of "illegal business practice" for having printed 20 thousand copies of a book about a political scandal in Shenyang City. He has always maintained his innocence, but after 17 months of preventive detention was sentenced to six years imprisonment.
Experts link the story to the wide support he gave in 2005 to the inhabitants of Taishi (Guangdong) in the fight against corruption of the mayor and the local Communist Party leaders, taking care of their legal defense and publishing many articles on the Internet to report the situation and violent police methods used against the population.
In December 2015 he was sentenced to six years in prison "for disturbing the social order". Before entering the prison, he gave, as is his right, a final declaration that was a sort of "prophecy" to the Communist Party: "By continuing to condemn democrats and those seeking justice you will only make them stronger, accelerating your fall".