China Wang Yonghang arrested
On July 4th, 2009, Chinese human rights lawyer Wang Yonghang was arrested. He has been held incommunicado since and reportedly has been beaten during his interrogation. Twenty plainclothes police broke into Wang Yonghang’s and took him and his wife to a detention centre. The police also searched their home and confiscated a computer, a camera, a printer and several books. His wife was released next day, but Wang was transferred to another place of detention.
On July 6, his wife learned that he was being detained at the Police Detention Centre in Dalian, a town in north-eastern China. When his lawyers wanted to meet their client on July 14th, they were turned back, which is in violation of the Law on Lawyers of the People’s Republic of China. According to his wife, Wang has been detained on suspicion of violation of article 300 of the Penal Code, which deals with ‘superstitious sects, secret societies and evil religious organizations’. This article has been applied frequently to imprison members of Falun Gong, a sect that is forbidden in China. Yonghang has frequently acted as legal counsel of members of Falun Gong.