Shi Tao

Shi Tao (zh-stp|s=师涛|t=師濤|p=Shī Tāo; born 25 July 1968) is a mainland Chinese journalist, writer and poet, who in 2005 was sentenced to imprisonment for 10 years for releasing a document of the Communist Party to an overseas Chinese democracy site. He had previously worked for the business daily "Dangdai Shang Bao" (Contemporary Business News) in Changsha.

Brief history

Shi Tao was born in Yanchi County (盐池县), Wuzhong, Ningxia province in 1968. He studied at East China Normal University in Shanghai. He graduated in July 1991, and was married in 1994.

Shi Tao works in Fushun Institute of Technology during 1997-99 but moved to Canada with family for personal reasons.

On October 18, 2005, the Committee to Protect Journalists announced that Shi was one of four winners of the 2005 CPJ International Press Freedom Awards. [cite web |url=http://www.cpj.org/awards05/shi_tao.html |title=IPFA 2005 - Shi Tao |accessdate=2007-01-21 |publisher=Committee to Protect Journalists] The Committee's website states he will be officially presented with the award when he is released from prison. [cite web |url=http://www.cpj.org/awards05/awards_release_05.html |title=IPFA awardees 2005 |accessdate=2007-01-21 |publisher=Committee to Protect Journalists]

In March 2006, he was given the Vasyl Stus Award. On November 28, 2006, he was given the Golden Pen of Freedom Award by the World Association of Newspapers.

Arrest and imprisonment

In 2004 at the age of 37, Shi Tao was working for the "Contemporary Business News" in the Hunan province of China.

On April 20, 2004, the Chinese government released the Number 11 document "A notice concerning the work for maintaining stability" (关于当前稳定工作的通知). In the document, it warned journalists that overseas pro-democracy Chinese dissidents may come back to mainland China during the 15th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square Protests of 1989 on June 4th, which would affect the politico-social order's stability. It asked all news media to not report anything regarding the so-called "June 4th event", Falun Gong or people calling for politico-social change. Shi used his private Yahoo! email account and sent a brief of the document to an overseas web site called [http://www.asiademo.org Asia Democracy Foundation] .

When the Chinese government found out, it demanded the sender's personal information from Yahoo!'s Hong Kong office. Yahoo! turned the information over without asking what it was for. Shortly thereafter, Shi Tao was detained on November 24, 2004. The Chinese authorities confiscated his computer and documents without showing any proper permit or document, and warned his family members not to talk about it with others. He was formally arrested on December 14.

His lawyer, Guo Guoting (郭国汀), famous for taking human rights cases, stated that the search and seizure and subsequent arrest were illegal. As a result, his license to practice law was suspended for one year by Shanghai's Department of Law. He was later put under house arrest, and one of his co-workers had to take over the case.

On March 11, 2005, Hunan Changsha Intermediate People's Court held its first hearing secretly. It lasted for two hours. Shi Tao's mother and brothers came all the way from Ningxia to Changsha, but they were not permitted to go inside and observe. After the hearing was over, Shi was permitted ten minutes of private time with his family members. Fifteen days later, he was sentenced to prison for ten years, and will lose his political rights for two years on the charge of leaking state secrets. [cite web |url=http://www.zonaeuropa.com/20050501_1.htm|title=EastSouthWestNorth: The Case of Shi Tao |accessdate=2007-01-21 ]

On June 2, 2005, the Hunan High People's Court rejected his lawyer's arguments and denied his appeal, keeping the original sentencing. Shi's mother, Gao Qinsheng, alleged "serious procedural defects" in her son's case , but his appeal was rejected without a hearing.

Reactions

The incident sparked a controversy about the business practices of Yahoo!, whose Hong Kong arm provided technical information connecting the message and email account with Shi Tao's computer. Yahoo! was criticized by Reporters Without Borders for acting as a "police informant". The United States Congress held a hearing about this and other similar incidents with representatives from Yahoo!, Google, and MSN, etc. In August of 2007, Congress began an investigation into Yahoo!'s handling of the case. [cite web |url=http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20167503/ |title=Yahoo faces scrutiny in China case |accessdate=2007-08-08 |publisher=MSNBC] Founder Jerry Yang has attended a hearing in the Congress. [ [http://www.rthk.org.hk/rthk/news/expressnews/news.htm?expressnews&20071107&55&444660 RTHK] ]

On August 28, 2007, the World Organization for Human Rights sued Yahoo! for allegedly passing information (email and IP address) with the Chinese government that caused the arrests of writers and dissidents. The suit was filed in San Francisco for journalists Shi Tao and Wang Xiaoning. [ [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/6966116.stm BBC NEWS, Yahoo! in China human rights case] ]

On November 6, 2007, the U.S. congressional panel criticized Yahoo! for not giving full details to the House Foreign Affairs Committee the previous year, stating it had been "at best inexcusably negligent" and at worst "deceptive". [ [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7081458.stm BBC NEWS, US rebukes Yahoo over China case] ]

On November 13, 2007, Yahoo settled with Shi for an undisclosed sum. Shi remains in prison. [http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5jxM79pzLTm4rNPLXXyUk9XVjr6YQD8SSU2S80]

Tao is married and has a son born in Fushun, Liaoning. There has been unverified news report that his wife divorced him subsequent to the jailing.

According to the International Herald Tribune, while visiting China, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on 27 February 2008 that she had raised the issue of a journalist and a writer jailed by China for expressing their views over the Internet during meetings with the Chinese foreign minister, Yang Jiechi. The Yahoo chief executive, Jerry Yang, asked Rice in a letter sent during the previous week to help secure the release of the journalist, Shi Tao, and the writer, Wang Xiaoning, who were imprisoned for sending pro-democracy information using e-mail messages or Yahoo groups.

Other cases

Other cases involving political prisoners in the People's Republic of China where information has been provided by Yahoo! are Li Zhi, Jiang Lijun, and Wang Xiaoning.

References

* [http://www.wan-press.org/article12609.html Shi Tao Wins Golden Pen of Freedom]
* [http://www.cpj.org/news/2005/China25aug05na.html Imprisoned journalist Shi Tao's family files for review of appeal] - Committee to Protect Journalists
* [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/4221538.stm Yahoo! 'helped jail China writer'] - BBC
* [http://www.ifex.org/en/content/view/full/69866/ CPJ to Honour Press Freedom Defenders] - IFEX

ee also

*Blocking of Wikipedia in mainland China
*Chinese Wikipedia
*Dissident
*Golden Shield Project
*Human rights in the People's Republic of China
*Internet censorship in the People's Republic of China
*Internet in the People's Republic of China
*Jerry Yang
*List of Chinese dissidents
*List of notable websites blocked in the People's Republic of China
*List of words censored by search engines in the People's Republic of China
*Ministry of Public Security of the People's Republic of China
*Political dissidents

External links

News reports

* [http://www.wan-press.org/article12610.html Jailed Chinese Journalist Wins WAN Golden Pen of Freedom] It has a picture of him.
* [http://web.amnesty.org/pages/chn-310106-action-eng Yahoo’s data contributes to arrests in China: free Shi Tao from prison in China!] Amnesty International article about Shi Tao
* [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/4221538.stm Yahoo 'helped jail China writer'] BBC News
* [http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=14884 Information supplied by Yahoo! helped journalist Shi Tao get 10 years in prison] Reporters Without Borders press release on Shi Tao
* [http://www.zonaeuropa.com/20050501_1.htm The Case of Shi Tao (师涛)] summary of Shi Tao's situation by blogger
* [http://www.penpoemrelay.org/ Shi Tao's poem "六月" (June)] - The PEN Poem Relay "Carrying the Torch for Freedom of Expression in China"
* [http://www.fa-kuan.de/JUNE.HTML Shi Tao's poem "六月" (Liuyue)] - Original poem in 繁體字/拼音 & different translations

Multimedia

* [http://streaming.scmp.com/podcasting/upload/tech_sept15.mp3 Audio story on Shi Tao case]
* [http://streaming.scmp.com/podcasting/upload/tech_hearings_feb21.mp3 Audio story on Yahoo!'s testimony to Congress about the Shi Tao case]

Notes