In 1995, Yue Tianxiang, a driver at the state-owned Tianshui City Transport Company, Gansu Province, was laid off from his job despite being owed three months’ back pay. When the company refused to negotiate a settlement regarding their wage arrears and to provide them with a legally entitled living allowance, Yue and another laid-off driver, Guo Xinmin 郭新民, decided to take their case to the Tianshui Labour Disputes Arbitration Committee. The Committee ruled that the company should find new positions for the two workers as soon as possible, but the company manager refused to implement this decision. When Yue and Guo learned that many of their fellow drivers in Tianshui faced the same kind of treatment, they set up a journal called China Labour Monitor and used it to publish articles on various labour rights-related issues, including reports of corruption at their former company. They also wrote an open letter to President Jiang Zemin asking for the central government to take action on these issues. In late 1998, after receiving no response from the authorities, they distributed their letter to the international news media. A few weeks later, in January 1999, they were detained by the Tianshui police and were eventually charged with “subversion of state power”. On 5 July 1999, Yue Tianxiang was tried and sentenced to 10 years’ imprisonment. (His fellow activist Guo Xinmin was also sentenced at the same time, but he was freed from prison around one year later.) Yue will be due for release in January 2009.
June 2005
[ close ]