This article is more than 2 years old

This article is more than 2 years old

The longtime Chinese dissident Qin Yongmin has been found guilty of state subversion and sentenced to 13 years in prison, in proceedings described by activists as little more than a show trial.

Qin, 64, a former steelworker who has been a democracy activist since the 1970s, fainted during his trial in May but was dragged back into court by bailiffs and propped up.

Qin was not fully conscious when prosecutors read out his indictment, according to his lawyers.

“It’s absurd how little they cared about even pretending it was a fair trial,” said Frances Eve, a researcher at Chinese Human Rights Defenders.

Qin was sentenced by the Wuhan intermediate court on Wednesday after serving three years in pre-trial detention, which will count toward his sentence. He previously served 20 years in prison and two in a labour camp for pro-democracy activities, including an attempt to register the China Democracy party.

By the time Qin is due to be released in 2028, he will have spent almost half of his life in prison.

When he was arrested in 2015 Qin was head of a pro-democracy group called China Human Rights Watch, also known as the “Rose Team”. He was accused of using the idea of a peaceful transition to a constitutional democracy to overthrow the leadership of the Chinese Communist party.

“The accused Qin Yongmin uses the internet and foreign media to hype his articles about ‘peaceful transition’ to publicise his subversion,” the indictment said, according to a copy posted online by China Human Rights Watch, citing public letters, online essays, and petitions by Qin as evidence.

His wife, Zhao Suli, was detained alongside Qin in 2015 and was not seen until 2018 when she met relatives in a park in Wuhan, according to Radio Free Asia. She is believed to remain under house arrest.

Qin was last convicted and sentenced to prison in 1998, after trying to establish a local chapter of the China Democracy party at a time when activists were trying to form opposition parties and spoke of the possibility of a “Beijing Spring”.

“Every young man who is dedicated to democracy can find their role, and work hard on their battlefield,” Qin wrote in an online essay cited in his indictment.