Social Stability - 188. page

In 2003, the Beijing authorities demolished Ye Gouzhu and his brohter Ye Guoqiang’s restaurant and their homes and gave them no compensation. For applying for permission to hold a public demonstration about it, they sentenced Ye Guozhu to a four-year prison term.

Hong Kong Ming Pao reports that, in anticipation of the 17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, Beijing has been strengthening control in order to prevent any unexpected incidents. The police are monitoring public transportation and detaining human rights activists.

"China’s universities look more and more like bureaucracies," said Chen Pingyuan, a renowned Beijing University professor. During the Guangzhou University School Culture Building Forum on October 9, 2007, the humanities scholar offered his observations on four major problems facing today’s Chinese universities. Jinan University Party Committee Secretary, Jiang Shuzhuo, and the Dean of Zhongshan University’s School of Humanities, Chen Chunsheng, also attended the Forum.

According to the Epoch Times, on October 14, 2007, at 9:00 a.m., just before the 17th National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), about 2000 villagers from Dongzhou Town in Shanwei City, Guangdong Province, held a demonstration using banners with such slogans as "anti-corruption," "oppose lawless officials," and "return my land."

Since 1999, Mrs. Liu Qingzhen, a retired teacher from Deng County, Henan Province, has unceasingly been appealing for justice for her husband. She has gone to Beijing to appeal to the central government 60 times, but was stopped 38 times, and put into custody in a black jail (a jail that no one admits exists) 4 times. Each time, she was detained for 10 days with no food, she was severely beaten and tortured, and governement officials consfiscated all of her personal belongings, including her cell phone.

More than 2,000 former rightists [1] cosigned an open letter [2] to the 17th National Congress, again requesting that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) redress the grievances of the Anti-Rightist Movement, abolish censorship and repay salaries owed to those who were labeled rightists in 1957. [3] The open letter was handed to representatives of the 17th National Congress through various channels.