This article is more than 3 years old

This article is more than 3 years old

Angela Merkel has urged China’s leaders to show some “humanity” as international condemnation intensifies over their refusal to allow the critically ill Nobel laureate Liu Xiaobo to be moved from the country for treatment.



After examining China’s most famous political prisoner on Saturday, doctors from Germany and the US said he was well enough to be taken overseas and had expressed a desire to go. A US lawyer representing Liu, 61, said a group of medical professionals and medical evacuation team was standing by and ready to transport Liu and his family out of China “as soon as permission is given to let them leave”.

Dying dissident Liu Xiaobo must be allowed to travel, UK and EU urge China Read more

However, China’s leaders have so far ignored calls for the Nobel laureate to be freed. Liu was diagnosed with late-stage cancer in May while serving an 11-year sentence.

He is on medical parole and held under guard in a hospital in the north-eastern city of Shenyang. On Tuesday the hospital said Liu was receiving emergency treatment for a second day and questions remain about whether he is well enough to travel.

Speaking to reporters in Berlin, the German chancellor’s spokesman, Steffen Seibert, said Merkel found the situation “depressing”.



“The tragic case of Liu Xiaobo is a great concern for the chancellor and she would like a signal of humanity for Liu Xiaobo and his family,” Seibert added.



Jared Genser, a Washington-based lawyer who represents Liu and is trying to secure his freedom, accused Beijing of blocking his exit in order to deny him one last platform from which to denounce its authoritarian rule.

“No one should believe that the Chinese government’s refusal to let him leave is for medical reasons … the Chinese government’s true purpose for denying Liu’s wishes is to make it impossible for Liu Xiaobo to communicate with his close friends, family and the international community,” he said. “President Xi should not be afraid of a dying man and what he might have to say.”

President Xi should not be afraid of a dying man and what he might have to say. Jared Genser

Germany went public with its anger about Beijing’s handling of Liu’s case on Monday, accusing Chinese security services of leaking surveillance footage of Liu being visited by a German doctor in order to bolster a propaganda campaign pushing the idea that the dissident was too ill to be evacuated from China.



“It seems that these recordings are being leaked selectively to certain Chinese state media outlets. It seems that security organs are steering the process, not medical experts,” the German embassy in Beijing said in a statement.



China rejected Germany’s criticism and Merkel’s appeal. “We oppose any countries interfering in China’s domestic affairs by using an individual case,” the foreign ministry spokesman, Geng Shuang, told a press briefing in Beijing, parroting, almost word-for-word previous rebuttals.

All mention of Liu, whom Beijing describes as a convicted criminal, has been purged from transcripts of the daily briefings that the foreign ministry posts on its website.

The Global Times, a Communist party-controlled tabloid, also hit back, accusing the international community of taking Liu “hostage” and using his cause to attack China.

The west was taking advantage of Liu’s case to “hype up [the idea] that ‘China is inhuman’,” the newspaper claimed in an editorial, which urged Beijing not to back down.



“Today’s China is stronger and more confident and will not yield to western pressure,” it said.



Additional reporting by Wang Zhen

