Human Rights Watch called for the subversion charges against Yao and Xiao to be dismissed.

"The sole purpose of these charges is to discourage other workers from protesting, making contacts with banned democracy groups, or speaking to foreign media," Adams said. "The workers were only asking for unemployment benefits already promised to them by the state."

Yao and Xiao went on trial on January 15, 2003, for their involvement in massive labor unrest during March 2002 in Liaoyang City in northeastern China. The verdicts and sentences have not yet been announced.

Human Rights Watch expressed concern about the methods that may have been used by Chinese security officials to collect statements by Yao, Xiao, and twenty-four others listed in the indictment as sources of evidence. After Yao Fuxin's wife visited him in detention, she reported his speech was slurred, one side of his body numb, and that he told her he had been kept in leg irons during his first four days in detention. Months before the indictment, police brutally beat one of the listed witnesses, according to a credible report received by Human Rights Watch.

According to the indictment, the two men were originally detained for "illegal assembly, demonstration and protest." At that time, the Public Security Bureau could have simply issued warnings or released the two at any time without turning the case over to the procuratorate for prosecution on criminal charges. Instead, the Public Security Bureau chose to approve the arrest. Almost five months later, the police "discovered the serious crime of endangering state security." Charged under Article 105 of the Criminal Law of the People's Republic of China, Yao and Xiao could be sentenced to life imprisonment.

The indictment reveals that the Liaoyang City People's Procuratorate based the subversion charges on alleged contacts with banned political organizations and on contacts with foreign media and human rights groups. The document lists a series of meetings and conversations that Yao and Xiao allegedly had in 1998 and 1999 with members of the China Democracy Party, an opposition political party advocating democratic pluralism, and describes Yao and Xiao's alleged activities in support of this movement. However, while the indictment states that these "'party-building' activities...were discovered and prevented by the Public Security Bureau" in 1999, Yao and Xiao were not arrested at that time, though others were.

The indictment also lists contacts that Yao and Xiao allegedly had with Hong Kong-based human rights groups and with foreign media, specifically Agence France-Presse and the Wall Street Journal, during the March 2002 demonstrations. According to the indictment, those conversations resulted in international coverage of the demonstrations that created "a despicable impression."

"China reserves some of its harshest punishment for those who get the word out about human rights violations," said Adams. "But being interviewed by The Wall Street Journal is hardly subversion."

The indictment was obtained by China Labor Watch and translated by Human Rights Watch. China Labor Watch is a New York-based non-governmental organization that often reports on violations of labor rights in China. China Labor Watch is not related to Human Rights Watch.

Human Rights Watch has appealed to the International Labor Organization (ILO) to intervene in the men's cases, stressing that the prosecution of the two workers violates China's commitment as an ILO member to respect internationally guaranteed rights of free association.

To read the indictment in English, please see: http://hrw.org/press/2003/02/chinaindictment.htm

The original Chinese text of the indictment is available upon request. To obtain a copy, please contact Liz Weiss at weisse@hrw.org.