FOUR CHINESE AIDS ACTIVISTS JAILED

Act Up-Paris &Aids policy project

AIDS ORPHANS HARASSED AND SUPPORTERS DETAINED

Sarah Davis, Human Rights Watch

Allison Dinsmore 1 215 575 3369

Chloe Forette ACT UP Paris 09 121 41 02

(Bangkok) Activists at the Bangkok International AIDS Conference will
present a petition to the Chinese government today demanding that
officials respect the rights of people with AIDS and AIDS activists in
that country. Ironically, four farmer-activists with HIV were actually
detained by the police this week while the international AIDS conference
was taking place. Two of the farmers, from Henan province, were picked
up as they began a trip to Beijing to try to meet with Chinese President
Hu Jintao, who was rumored to be visiting a Beijing hospital. In
addition, this week a school for AIDS orphans was forcibly closed by the
local officials and two villagers who attempted to prevent the school
closing were arrested. The government officials dragged some of the
children into vehicles before relatives came to demand their release.

Other sections of the petition touch on the need for China to provide
care and treatment for all people with AIDS regardless of the means of
transmission of the virus, the role of government corruption in the
deaths of people in Henan, the need for outside access to regions of the
country hardest hit by AIDS. But the detention of the four activists has
overshadowed other issues.

Says Stephen Leblanc, a member of the AIDS Policy Project, "The irony is
that while hundreds of Chinese officials are hobnobbing with
international activists and experts in Bangkok, their local activists
are being harassed and imprisoned by the Chinese government. This is
unacceptable. International AIDS activists would like to be more
positive about China_s progress on AIDS in the past year, but it’s
impossible with Chinese activists facing arrest and jails." The AIDS
activists call for the immediate and unconditional of release of all
four detainees and halt of the harassment of all people involved in the
fight against HIV/AIDS.

AIDS activists in China, and even volunteers who try to help the
country’s many AIDS orphans, are frequently harrassed, beaten, and
intimidated by the authorities. As many as one million Chinese farmers
became infected during illegal bloodselling schemes in the 1990s
officials. These same officials covered up the epidemic for many years
and now often harrass people with AIDS who seek treatment or redress of
grievances.

Chinese, French, Italian, South African, American, Australian,
Taiwanese, Greek, Canadian, British, New Zealander, and Hong Kong
activists signed the petition, which expresses solidarity with the
Chinese activists and demands access to science-based prevention,
treatment and treatment education, and orphan care, among other issues.
In addition to AIDS groups, several of the signers are eminent scholars
of Chinese culture, such as Perry Link, who edited The Tienneman Papers.

Says Chloe Forette of ACT UP Paris, "The world is watching how the
Central Government responds when Henan officials oppress people with
AIDS. We see that they do nothing. Despite what they say, China seems to
condone corruption and violence among local officials."

Last year, the World Health Organization sent a delegation to Henan to
investigate conditions. Shortly after the visit, press reports stated
that local officials had sanitized the areas visited by W.H.O., forcibly
evacuating people with AIDS and altering records. One woman who hid in
order to try to speak to the W.H.O. delegation was severely beaten by
local authorities.