Open Letter asking Xi Jinping to Resign

In March 2016, an anonymous open letter, entitled The Open Letter about Calling for Comrade Xi Jinping's Resigning from His Leading Posts of the Party and the State (Chinese: 关于要求习近平同志辞去党和国家领导职务的公开信; pinyin: guānyú yāoqiú Xí Jìnpíng tóngzhì cíqù dǎng hé guójiā lǐngdǎo zhíwù de gōngkāi xìn), purporting to be from unnamed "loyal Communist Party members", allegedly resulted in the detention of dozens of Chinese citizens, including (temporarily) six relatives of two overseas dissidents.

Background

Chinese media is heavily regulated; government censors often remove content on websites and social media. By 2015, China had 49 reporters behind bars, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists; Freedom House had ranked the country as the world's worst abuser of internet freedom. In February 2016, Xi Jinping visited state media outlets in a tour widely seen as an attempt to further bring journalists to heel and to stamp out freedom of expression. Early 2016 saw a spate of publicized censorship incidents and a crackdown on journalists, lawyers, and dissidents.[1][2]

In recent years, China has detained relatives of dissident writers living overseas to pressure the writers into self-censorship.[3]

Publication

The open letter asking Xi to resign his post of General Secretary of the Communist Party of China (paramount leader and party leader),[4] was first posted on Canyu. It was republished by other outlets, most notably by the state-linked Watching.cn (also known as Wujie News), but was quickly taken down from Watching.[2] The letter accuses Mr Xi of being a dictator and of committing serious economic and diplomatic blunders.[5] The authors claim to be writing the letter out of concern for Xi and his family's "personal safety", which may be an implicit threat.[6][7] The Wall Street Journal speculates that the open letter may indeed have been penned by dissatisfied insiders within the ruling Communist Party, as unlike typical dissident manifestos, the letter uses Party jargon and contains no call for significant democratic reform.[7] Professor Xiao Qiang of the University of California, Berkeley, agreed the phrasing is unusual: "Bluff or true, this tone sounds more like coup plotters talking to the leader they want to depose, rather than an open letter with dissenting political views." On the other hand, the letter may be an elaborate ruse; there is no independent evidence of any coup plot.[4]

Excerpt from the open letter

On the cultural and ideological front, you [Xi Jinping] have emphasised 'party-surnamed media' [an official campaign to get all media to toe the party line], and have disregarded the citizen aspect of the media, stunning the whole nation; you supported... low-standard people to become our literary representatives, disappointing the workers in the larger literary world; you have condoned cultural units in directly singing your praises; your wife Peng Liyuan's sister took over the producing duties of the CCTV Spring Gala, causing everyone's beloved and anticipated programme to become your personal propaganda tool. Your condoning of a personality cult, not allowing 'rash opinions of central leadership', creating a 'one voice party' method - those of us who have gone through the Cultural Revolution can't help but feel secretly worried - our party, country and citizens cannot go through yet another 10-year catastrophe![2]

Government response

Prominent Chinese columnist Jia Jia was detained for ten days.[2][3] Chang Ping, a liberal Chinese writer living in Germany, stated that two younger brothers and a younger sister were "abducted by the Chinese police" after Chang criticized Jia's detention. The government also detained the parents and younger brother of another liberal Chinese writer, Wen Yunchao, who lives in the United States.[3] All three writers deny any involvement in the open letter.[2][8] On March 30, 2016, Deutsche Welle reported that all the detained relatives of both dissidents had been released.[9]

Ouyang Hongliang, the president of Watching, was also detained.[2] According to the BBC, a Watching staff member stated at least 15 other people employed at Watching or an associated technology company had been "taken away".[10] The report that ten of the detained employees worked for the technology company spurred speculation that perhaps the letter was published on Watching by a hacker, or alternatively by some sort of web-crawling software that republishes content.[7]

On 18 January 2018, a Chinese lawyer, Yu Wensheng, published an online post called for the removal of Xi and for reforms in the legal and political systems. He was picked up by police next day. Three months earlier, Yu also demanded Xi's resignation in an open letter, accusing China under his rule as “marching backwards”.[11] According to the report from Deutsche Welle, on 17 June 2020 the Chinese court convicted and sentenced a four-year jail to Yu Wensheng and depriving of political rights for three years on the charge of “inciting subversion of state power”.[12]

See also

Notes
  1. "China magazine Caixin defiant on censorship of article". BBC News. 9 March 2016. Archived from the original on 28 March 2016. Retrieved 29 March 2016.
  2. "China columnist Jia Jia detained by Beijing police, his lawyer says". BBC News. 21 March 2016. Archived from the original on 25 March 2016. Retrieved 29 March 2016.
  3. Edward Wong (28 March 2016). "Chinese Writer in Germany Says 3 Siblings Are Detained Over Xi Letter". New York Times. Archived from the original on 28 March 2016. Retrieved 29 March 2016.
  4. Buckley, Chris (29 March 2016). "Anonymous Call for Xi to Quit Rattles Party Leaders in China". New York Times. Archived from the original on 30 March 2016. Retrieved 30 March 2016.
  5. Carney, Matthew (29 March 2016). "China continues severe crackdown over letter demanding Xi Jinping's resignation". Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Archived from the original on 29 March 2016. Retrieved 29 March 2016.
  6. "The Backlash Against Xi Jinping". Wall Street Journal. 28 March 2016. Archived from the original on 28 March 2016. Retrieved 29 March 2016.
  7. Rauhala, Emily (25 March 2016). "People 'taken away' as investigation into letter calling for Xi resignation widens". Washington Post. Archived from the original on 22 March 2016. Retrieved 29 March 2016.
  8. Yuli Yang; Katie Hunt (28 March 2016). "Family members detained as backlash over open letter intensifies". CNN. Archived from the original on 28 March 2016. Retrieved 29 March 2016.
  9. Philipp Bilsky (30 March 2016). "China: Relatives of DW journalist freed". Archived from the original on 31 March 2016. Retrieved 31 March 2016.
  10. John Sudworth (25 March 2016). "China 'detained 20 over Xi resignation letter'". BBC News. Archived from the original on 28 March 2016. Retrieved 29 March 2016.
  11. Verna, Yu (18 June 2020). "Chinese human rights lawyer jailed for four years, says his wife". The Guardian. Retrieved 2 August 2020.
  12. Yang, William (17 June 2020). "Yu Wensheng was sentenced to four years in prison and his wife Xu Yan criticized the secret sentence". DW. Retrieved 2 August 2020.
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