  2003 Annual Report |
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Asia |
| Europe |
| Mid-East/Africa |
| Americas |
In January 2003, Dr. Charles Li, an American citizen and medical doctor and an adherent of Falun Gong, was arrested and charged with sabotage. It is believed that governmental objection to his religious practice is what spurred his arrest, in grave violation of the principles of religious freedom enunciated in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights as well as in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. We wrote objecting to this human-rights violation and requesting that the government ensure that Dr. Li's trial be conducted fairly and that he be permitted access to a lawyer. He remains in jail in Nanjing.
We initiated and researched a petition on behalf of 19 colleagues imprisoned on charges that appear to lack internationally-recognized legal merit. The following groups joined with us as co-sponsors: the New York Academy of Sciences Committee on the Human Rights of Scientists, the American Physical Society Committee on the International Freedom of Scientists, the American Chemical Society, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science Committee on Scientific Freedom and Responsibility. The petition garnered the signatures of 171 individual scientists, academics, and physicians. A similar version of the petition was sent out later, with an additional 850 signatures attached.
Vietnam
We protested the impending closing of the Mae Tao Clinic in Mae Sot and the deportation of its staff to Burma. This clinic, located on the border, is run primarily by ethnic Karens, a persecuted group within Burma, and provides medical assistance to Burmese refugees fleeing from the harsh conditions there. Reportedly the closing of this clinic was ordered in hopes of appeasing the Burmese government. Last summer, the head of the clinic, Dr. Cynthia Maung, was awarded the First Annual Jonathan Mann Global Health and Human Rights Award.
Nguyen Dan Que, an endocrinologist and former Director of the Cho-Ray Hospital in Ho Chi Minh City, was arrested in March 2003. Dr. Que had spent ten years in jail without a trial, beginning in 1978. In 1990 he was again arrested and spent more than eight years in solitary confinement, enduring harsh and physically debilitating conditions. We wrote at that time appealing on his behalf and then again when, even after his release in 1998, it was clear that Dr. Que and his family were being harassed by public security police. When he was arrested anew this past March, it was without any indication of the charges against him. On March 22 the arrest was made public in a small column in an official newspaper; according to the police, Dr. Que was caught sending documents containing material that "runs against the State." It now appears that Dr. Que had e-mailed his brother in Virginia disparaging the Vietnamese government's claim that it guarantees freedom of information and making other comments of a critical nature. We wrote on Dr. Que's behalf, but there has been no sign of improvement in his situation.
