China Flexes Controversial New Law as Taiwanese Activist Pleads Guilty to Subversion

(YUEYANG, China) — A Taiwanese activist has pleaded guilty to subverting state power in China’s first prosecution of a nonprofit worker on criminal charges since Beijing passed a law tightening controls over foreign non-governmental organizations. “I spread articles that maliciously attacked the Communist Party of China, China’s existing system and China’s government,” the activist, Lee Ming-che, told the court in the central Chinese city of Yueyang. Lee said he also organized people and wrote articles “intended to subvert the state’s power.” Subversion of state power is a vaguely defined charge often used by authorities to muzzle dissent and imprison critics. Lee’s wife, Lee Ching-yu, had warned that he might be pressured into pleading guilty. China’s wide-ranging crackdown on civil society has featured a string of televised “confessions” — believed to have been coerced — from human rights activists accused of plots to overthrow the political system. “I want to ask my fellow countrymen for their understanding if they see Lee Ming-che do or say anything unbearable in court outside of his free will,” Lee Ching-yu told reporters over the weekend before leaving Taiwan so she could be at the trial. “This is just the Chinese government being adept at the performance.” Security was tight at the Yueyang City Intermediate People’s Court, with barricades on the stre...
Source: TIME.com: Top Science and Health Stories - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Uncategorized China onetime Taiwan Source Type: news