Security Agents Detain U.S. Human Rights NGO Executive Director After Beijing Human Rights Seminar

Chinese security personnel in Beijing detained the executive director of a respected U.S. human rights NGO after she attended a seminar associated with the EU-China bilateral human rights dialogue, according to a number of press accounts on July 1 and 2. Sharon Hom, executive director of Human Rights in China (HRIC), said that security agents detained her for five hours in her Beijing hotel on June 21 following the conclusion of the human rights seminar.

Ms. Hom wrote an account of her detention for the July 1 edition of the Asian Wall Street Journal. She described being approached outside her hotel room by three officers of the Beijing State Security Bureau, who invited her to "have a friendly chat and ask...a few questions." She parried an invitation to leave the hotel with the agents to have the conversation at a "place close by" that was more "convenient," and when she tried to end the conversation and depart, one of the agents grabbed her by the arm "until I angrily and loudly demanded that he let me go."

Ms. Hom told the Washington Post that the agents eventually agreed to question her in the presence of David Sedney, the U.S. deputy chief of mission, and two European ambassadors. The officers queried her about "her identity, her participation in the seminar, her activities in Beijing and her opinion of the changes in China over the past two decades."
 

Ms. Hom said she wishes to "acknowledge and encourage the increasing openness and engagement of China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs," but offered the view that her detention shows that "the pervasive practice of social control through a state security and secret police apparatus" appeared to have trumped the Ministry's authority. Reuters reported on July 5, however, that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs had accused Ms. Hom of fabricating her name and identity and said that she had "gained an entry visa through deceit." According to Reuters, a Ministry spokesman said that "Hom admitted the behavior of concealing her status was wrong and apologized to the conference sponsors." Ms. Hom said, however, that she hid nothing when she applied for a visa, and her name was listed as an official representative of HRIC and the International Federation for Human Rights on the formal list of seminar participants.

Chinese officials have cancelled conferences in Beijing involving international participants in the recent past. In May 2005, the government abruptly and without explanation cancelled an academic conference organized by Fordham University and the China University of Political Science and Law. The government has also been conducting a campaign against politically active scholars, writers, and professionals since December 2004.