CHINA
Liu Di
Update November 30, 2003
Liu Di is Released
Liu Di, a twenty-two year-old psychology major at Beijing Normal University, frequently posted comments on Chinese Internet chatrooms, under the pen name “stainless-steel mouse.” In 2001, she started her own a chatroom, “A Life Like Fire,” in 2001 after police closed down one she preferred. Liu published several articles on the Xici on-line bulletin board that criticized government restrictions on the Internet. One of her articles expressed sympathy for Huang Qi, a webmaster jailed in June 2000 the on-line bulletin board he ran published articles relating to several taboo topics, including the 1989 Tiananmen Square democracy demonstrations.
On November 7, 2002, officers of the State Security Protection Bureau removed her from her campus. Five months later she has yet to surface. Her family does not know where she is; she has had no access to legal counsel. Public Security Bureau officials later searched the family home, removing her computer, notebooks, and floppy disks. The Beijing branch of China’s State Security Bureau has notified Ms. Liu’s family that she is being held on charges of “being detrimental to state security.”
According to friends and university officials, the police had warned her several times to stop posting articles critical of the government and in defense of other jailed Internet users. In some of her web essays, Ms. Liu urged readers to “ignore government propaganda and live freely,” and to spread “reactionary” ideas via the Internet.” “Even though the Chinese Communist Party has power over us, but if we can’t feel it, pretend and live as if it doesn’t exist,” she wrote.
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