Chinese food scandal protestor jailed

Today’s Telegraph reports that Zhao Lianhai, who created a website to highlight the plight of children poisoned in a major food adulteration scandal in China, has been jailed for 2 1/2 years.


Zhao created the site in 2009 after his son was poisoned after being fed adulterated formula milk. He was one of about 300,000 Chinese toddlers who were poisoned (of which at least six of them died) by milk that contained melamine, an industrial chemical that was added to make the milk appear to contain more protein than was actually the case.

The website quickly became a focal point for thousands of parents who were outraged at the crisis, and that the issue had initially been covered up.

As more and more parents began to call for justice and compensation, and Mr Zhao began to press their case publicly, he came to the attention of the Chinese authorities.

Last November, he was arrested by the police and then charged in March with "creating a disturbance". His lawyer, Li Fangping, said the evidence for the charge had been that Mr Zhao had given a media interview on a public pavement, held a dinner in a restaurant for a dozen parents of other victims, and that he had held up a small sign in protest outside a trial of milk company executives responsible for the poisoning.

As his sentence was announced, Mr Zhao protested in court, stripping off his prisoner's uniform and refusing to be handcuffed. "I am not guilty!" he said. Mr Li said he would appeal the sentence, and that Mr Zhao was in "quite good health, but anxious. He has not seen his wife and two children for almost a year."

Mr Zhao has already served one year of his sentence, and will now have another year-and-a-half of prison time.

Three people have been sentenced to death for their role in the toxic milk case, and the general manager and chairwoman of Sanlu, the milk company at the heart of the scandal, was given a life sentence. Dozens of officials, dairy executives and farmers have been punished for allowing the contamination to take place.

What to say? Words fail.Source URL: http://idontwanttobeanythingotherthanme.blogspot.com/search/label/Human%20rights
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Iranian "King of the bloggers" sentenced to 19 1/2 years

For me Hossein Derakshan falls in to the category "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it". From what I have read of his work ( mainly his Comment is Free articles in the Grauniad) he could certainly write utter rubbish.

What he certainly doesn't deserve is a huge prison sentence. 19 1/2 year prison sentence followed being convicyed of "cooperating with enemy states, making propaganda against the Islamic system of government, promoting small anti-revolutionary groups, managing obscene web sites and insulting Islamic sanctities,".

He had been in detention in Evin prison in Tehran since his arrest on November 1, 2008,
Hadi Ghaemi, executive director of the International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran, condemned the sentence. "This is the longest sentence issued against a blogger in Iran, and it is solely because of his opinions and blogging. The sentence is meant to send a chilling message to the Iranian youth to stay away from the internet in practicing their freedom of expression,"

A journalist working on a reformist newspaper before emigrating to Canada in 200,Derakhshan set up a blog , titled Editor Myself on i.hoder.com. It gained worldwide attention, particularly for his blog start up guides for fellow Iranians.
He was no stranger to controversy: in 2006 he became what must have been the traveled to Israel on his Canadian passport.
Shortly before his imprisonment Hossein Derakhshan began writing in support of of the regime, However this was not enough to save his skin.

To get an idea of Derakhshan's later work try this index at Comment is Free. Proof positive that a volte face will not save you from a regime like Iran's.

Even if I think much of the CiF writings are utter drivel (check out his critique of Persepolis for a corker of twisted logic!) there is no way the man deserve 19.5 seconds in custody, let alone the appalling sentence handed down by the regime.Source URL: http://idontwanttobeanythingotherthanme.blogspot.com/search/label/Human%20rights
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