The Briefing Room
General Category => World News => Topic started by: EC on June 09, 2013, 05:19:46 am
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Via the BBC: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-22831369
A court in China has sentenced the brother-in-law of imprisoned Nobel Peace Prize winner Liu Xiaobo to 11 years in jail on fraud charges.
The lawyer defending Liu Hui said the jail term was out of all proportion to the alleged offence.
He said it should have been treated as a civil dispute, not a criminal matter.
Liu Xiaobo was already in jail when he won the Nobel prize in 2010 for campaigning for peaceful democratic change in China.
Since then his wife, Liu Xia - sister of Liu Hui - has been held under strict house arrest in what she says is an official vendetta against his family.
The court in Huairou, north-east of Beijing, convicted Liu Hui, a manager in a property company, of defrauding a man of 3m yuan ($490,000; £315,000) along with a colleague.
"As Liu Hui's defence attorney I definitely do not approve of this verdict, because we see this fundamentally as a civil issue, and it fundamentally does not constitute criminal fraud," lawyer Mo Shaoping told reporters.
He said Liu Hui maintained his innocence.
More at link.
Prison. The new re-education camps.