The Case of Zhang Kai: Refuting Lies, Clarifying the Facts, and Setting the Record Straight

By China Change, published: February 29, 2016

Lawyer Zhang Kai was taken into police custody in Wenzhou on August 25, 2015. He was placed in residential surveillance in a designated location for six months, after which he appeared on Chinese television to make a “confession” on February 25.

Zhang, 37, appeared thin and haggard, and his hair made him look like a concentration camp prisoner. We still don’t know what kind of ordeal he suffered during those six months. Looking at the language used in his “confession,” which was delivered in the tone and style of the official media, viewers were left feeling that he had been forced to read from a script prepared for him by the authorities.

On February 28, Zhang Kai’s parents announced that Zhang had been transferred to criminal detention at 9 p.m. on February 26. According to Pastor Bob Fu’s Twitter feed: “[Zhang Kai’s] father was taken to Wenzhou by that city’s public security and domestic security police on February 27. By the morning of the 28th he was at the Wenzhou Public Security Bureau where he will likely be held temporarily and deprived of his freedom.”

I. Chinese media reports on Zhang Kai’s case mention “Fu XX and Yang XX of an overseas organization” and also charge that “each year this overseas organization used documents he provided to concoct lists of so-called ‘Top Ten Cases of Religious Persecution,’ which were included in ‘China Human Rights Report’ and contained unbridled vilifications of China’s image.” Pastor Bob Fu (傅希秋), of the Texas-based China Aid Association, Purdue University Professor Yang Fenggang (杨凤岗) who directs Purdue’s Center on Religion and Chinese Society, and Guo Baosheng (郭宝胜), author of the annual “Top Ten Persecution Cases,” have all issued separate statements:

Professor Yang Fenggang’s statement (translation by China Aid): Zhang Kai is a friend of mine. He spent a year with me as a visiting scholar of the Center on Religion and Chinese Society at Purdue University in 2013-2014. He was one of the most courageous lawyers in defending Christian churches in Wenzhou whose rooftop crosses were facing forceful removal by the authorities. It is apparent that all Zhang Kai did was providing legal counsel to the willing churches, encouraging their leaders to use the existing law and regulations to defend their own rights. He urged both Christians and government officials to abide by the law and do not do anything beyond legal boundaries. His purported confession on Wenzhou Television on February 25, 2016 appears to me to be scripted and he appears to be physically exhausted. The few “evidences” shown in the television program all appear to be dated before 2013, so that even if they were true documents they have nothing to do with Zhang Kai’s activities in Wenzhou between August 2014 and August 2015. I urge Wenzhou authorities abide by the existing Chinese law and release Zhang Kai immediately. Fenggang Yang

February 25, 2016

Bob Fu’s Statement regarding forced Confession on TV by jailed Human Rights Lawyer Zhang Kai (translation by China Aid) Zhang Kai was seen on official TV in Wenzhou on Thursday for the first time since he was detained and put into a “black jail” six months ago. He looked like he was under duress while making those ISIS/North Korea-style, scripted remarks about his confessed crimes of “endangering national security” and “gathering a mob to disturb social order,” of which he has been accused simply for his organized, legal defense work against the forced cross demolition campaign, which still continues. I am proud of being Zhang Kai’s close friend and fellow Christian brother. I do believe he is innocent. Although I was sad as I painfully watched him condemn me and China Aid on the CPC’s official TV broadcast, I know he must have been going through enormous suffering and torture in the past six months (little did the evil authorities know that he and I actually made a pre-arranged agreement before his imprisonment that he would never compromise nor betray us in any way, unless he faces insurmountable hardship). We are always proud of you, and we love you, dear brother Zhang Kai. Keep up a good spirit, and may the comfort of the Holy Spirit be with you and heal you after you are free from physical bondage. Although my name and China Aid are mentioned as an “overseas force supporting Zhang Kai’s legal defense work,” which is the shameful propaganda of CCP, we will never be intimidated, nor will we cease to continue to promote religious freedom for all in China. Bob Fu

February 26, 2016

Statement of Pastor Guo Baosheng on the Zhang Kai Case At midnight on August 27, 2015, the Chinese authorities forcibly put lawyer Zhang Kai under residential surveillance in a designated location on charges of “suspected gathering a crowd to disrupt social order and stealing, procuring, or illegally providing state secrets or intelligence to overseas entities.” Zhang had been representing the lawful rights and interests of those trying to prevent the demolition of church crosses in Wenzhou. On February 25, 2016, Zhejiang Television broadcast a program featuring Zhang Kai’s so-called confession. In that program, the authorities said that one of the charges against Zhang Kai was that he had provided materials to overseas entities and concocted the so-called “Top Ten Cases of Religious Persecution.” This charge is clearly related to the lists of the top ten persecution cases involving Chinese Christians that I have posted on the China Aid website in recent years (see attached). But I state here that these documents were not provided by Zhang Kai and have no connection to him whatsoever. These posts were based on materials I was able to find on public websites both in China and overseas. This is an example of the authorities’ attempt to frame Zhang Kai without the slightest bit of evidence. On this basis, I state for the record that the charge of “stealing, procuring, or illegally providing state secrets or intelligence to overseas entities” against Zhang Kai is totally baseless. Pastor Guo Baosheng February 26, 2016

II. A lesser-known lawyer from Jiangsu named Wang Xiuping (汪秀平) also took part in the Wenzhou church cases. He related Zhang Kai’s work in Wenzhou and the real picture of Wenzhou Christians’ rights defense efforts:

Respected Brother Zhang Kai has confessed. The only thing I find odd about this is the fact that some people find it odd that he has confessed. I’ve taken part in the Wenzhou church cases. We lawyers have exhausted all conventional means, but the courts either refuse to accept our lawsuits or else rule against us in first- and second instance. When we’ve followed ordinary procedure and applied to hold demonstration marches, the authorities refuse to give approval. When Christians raise crosses to express their ordinary demands, they’re treated as criminals. Below are some of the ways I’m aware of in which the public has been misled with deliberate falsehoods: In many of the original Zhejiang church cases Zhang Kai already exhausted all legal means without any result. There was no other choice but to let Christians gather to express their demands. This is contrary to reports that say that Lawyer Zhang didn’t use legal methods. There’s nothing at all shameful about receiving funds from abroad to engage in rights defense. Lawyer Zhang dispensed these funds to the lawyers who have been working on these cases. Moreover, the people in charge of these so-called overseas organizations are all good friends of Zhang Kai, like Professor Yang Fenggang of Purdue University. I’m also in touch with Professor Yang on WeChat. If I’m working on religious cases and he wants to provide financial support, what’s the big deal? A few local Christians appeared on TV too denouncing that Zhang Kai had received huge consultation fees in the Wenzhou church cases. First of all, these were ordinary fees paid to a lawyer for handling a case. Zhang Kai was ready to go to jail from the beginning for getting involved in these huge rights-defense cases, so why shouldn’t he receive such fees? Second, Zhang said on many occasions that, for the later cases he handled on behalf of the Wenzhou churches whose crosses were being demolished, his decision to take part came after difficult internal struggle. He knew there was a high risk of going to jail because of the way the local officials were dealing with things, so he decided not to have other lawyers “dive into the deep end” with him on these cases. Instead, he rushed to the front lines on his own. The reports deliberately blur the distinction between demolition of illegally built churches and demolition of crosses. As everyone knows, for the past two years only one church has been torn down in Zhejiang for being an illegal structure. The rest of the demolitions have all been crosses. What’s more, crosses have been torn down from countless churches that are not illegal at all. Many of the pastors who have opposed the cross demolitions remain in detention. Judging from the video of Brother Zhang Kai’s confession, he clearly appears to have lost around a third of his weight. He was once a really heavy guy! The Zhejiang authorities are shrewdly trying to shift responsibility for the church-state conflicts they have created onto Zhang Kai and present ordinary rights defense work as a kind of treason. You have to marvel what they do. Lawyers and everyone else: We mustn’t fear these hooligans and their efforts to use culture to carry out their thuggery!

——–

Related:

Lawyer Zhang Kai’s Work From 2003 – Present, by Qin Chenshou, March 1, 2016.

The Work of Lawyer Zhang Kai: ‘I Have God as My Backer’, August 31, 2015

Share this: Tweet



Print

Email



Like this: Like Loading...