Police roust activist’s husband for 2 a.m. beating

Boxun has learned that on Monday,Nov. 10, 2014—during the APEC summit in Beijing—Dong Jiqin, the husband of human rights defense lawyer Ni Yulan, was beaten by Beijing Xinjiekou subdistrict police.

Ni Yulan said, “At 2 a.m. a plainclothes police officer came into our courtyard and let the air out of my husband’s electric bike tires. Afterwards, he banged on our door. When my husband opened the door and asked what he was doing, the policeman said he was looking for a villager. My husband asked him to show his ID, but the officer refused. My husband accompanied him to the gate and the officer then called two other plainclothes officers in a black sedan. They came and beat my husband, snatched his cell phone and smashed it. The emergency number 110 didn’t respond and send police.”

Because of her work defending people against forced demolition of their houses, Ni Yulan has been jailed many times, evicted from her home, suffered the revocation of her law license and was beaten until she was disabled. In 2011 Ni Yulan received Holland’s Human Rights Tulip Award, but she wasn’t permitted to go and receive it. Her daughter tried to go in her place but was intercepted and attacked by the police. In April 2012, she once more was sentenced to prison for the crimes of “creating a disturbance” and “fraud.” After she was released, police pressure prevented her from finding a secure place to live, causing her to sleep in the street.

On Oct. 31, Ni Yulan moved to a new apartment. But starting on the afternoon of Tuesday, Nov. 4, her new landlord demanded that Ni Yulan move. The landlord said: “You have one week to move out.”

Ni Yulan’s daughter said, “The new place my mother rented began to be under constant surveillance by Beijing Xinjiekou police from the night of Thursday, Nov. 6. That night, Xinjiekou police threatened to ram my father with their car. The police car stopped less than 10 centimeters from my father.”

http://news.boxun.com/news/gb/china/2014/11/201411100846.shtml

(Copy editor’s note: for further info on Ni Yulan, check this link to the New York-based Committee to Support Chinese Lawyers – http://www.csclawyers.org/cases/NiYulan/