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Catholic pro-democracy figure Jimmy Lai gets jail time for involvement in Hong Kong Tiananmen Square vigil

December 13, 2021 Catholic News Agency 3
Jimmy Lai Chee Ying arrving at the West Kowloon Magistrates’ Court, Hong Kong, Oct. 15, 2020. / Yung Chi Wai Derek/Shutterstock

Denver Newsroom, Dec 13, 2021 / 15:01 pm (CNA).

Jimmy Lai, a Catholic and prominent figure in the ongoing pro-democracy movement in Hong Kong, has been sentenced to a 13-month jail sentence for participating in a 2020 vigil commemorating the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre. 

Lai, alongside fellow activists Gwyneth Ho and Chow Hang Tung, received his sentence Dec. 9 for “inciting” and taking part in an “unlawful assembly.” 

Lai wrote in a statement read by his lawyer: “[L]et me suffer the punishment of this crime, so I may share the burden and glory of those young men and women who shed their blood [during the 1989 massacre] to proclaim truth, justice and goodness.”

Lai was among a group of thousands of people who defied a Chinese prohibition and attended a candlelight vigil in mid-2020 marking the 32nd anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre. Annual vigils to remember the event had been held each year in Hong Kong up to that point; 2020’s vigil was ostensibly canceled over COVID-19 concerns. 

During the 1989 clash between protestors and Chinese troops, tanks rolled into Beijing’s Tiananmen Square and military forces opened fire on university students and other citizens calling for democratic reforms. According to one account, as many as 10,000 people died. Information about the massacre is widely suppressed in China. 

2021 marks the second year in a row that authorities have forbidden a commemoration of the event. 

During his trial, Lai had argued that he had lit candles during the vigil in a personal capacity, and had not “incited” others to join the unauthorised rally, the BBC reported. Lai is already serving a prison sentence for an earlier charge and will serve his latest sentence concurrently.

Lai, 74, has supported the Hong Kong pro-democracy movement for over 30 years and has said that his Catholic faith is a major motivating factor in his pro-democracy advocacy. He converted to Catholicism in 1997.

Hong Kong is a special administrative region of China. Hong Kongers have, historically, largely enjoyed freedom of worship and evangelization, while in mainland China, there is a long history of persecution for Christians who run afoul of the government.

Millions of citizens of Hong Kong, including many Catholics, have in recent years participated in large-scale pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong, which came to a head during summer 2019. Beijing has in recent years tightened control over the island territory and cracked down on dissent.

On July 1, 2020, a controversial National Security Law went into effect in Hong Kong, having been imposed on the territory by Beijing, bypassing the Hong Kong legislature. In so doing, the Chinese government seized more power to suppress pro-democracy protests, which it sees as a direct challenge to its power.

Lai is a self-made billionaire and media mogul, and is one of the highest-profile people to be detained under the new law. Another notable arrested figure is Martin Lee Chu-ming, an octogenarian Catholic lawyer who founded Hong Kong’s Democratic Party in 1994. 

Under the new law, a person who is convicted of secession, subversion, terrorism or collusion with foreign forces will receive a minimum of 10 years in prison, with the possibility of a life sentence. Lai’s latest sentence was not under this particular law, but he does face charges under the security law as well. 

Benedict Rogers, chief executive of the UK-based Hong Kong Watch, condemned the recent convictions and said that they go against Hong Kong’s Basic Law, or constitution. 

“These convictions make a mockery of claims that the Hong Kong Government continues to uphold the Basic Law, which guarantees the right to freedom of assembly, freedom of association, and freedom of religion or belief,” Rogers said in a Dec. 9 statement. 

“It is increasingly clear that the Hong Kong Government is little more than a vassal of the Chinese Communist Party in Beijing. Lacking autonomy, decency, and common sense, it appears hell-bent on erasing Hong Kong’s autonomy, culture, and history,” he wrote, adding that the international community “must respond by calling for the immediate release of Jimmy Lai and all political prisoners in Hong Kong,” and calling for sanctions.  

A band of nearly 200 police officers first arrested Lai on Aug. 10, 2020, along with at least nine others connected with the Apple Daily newspaper, as part of an apparent crackdown on civil liberties in the island territory. They also raided the newspapers’ offices.

Apple Daily, the newspaper that Lai founded in 1995, has distinguished itself over the years as a publication critical of the Chinese government in Beijing, and strongly pro-democracy.

The island territory got a new bishop earlier this month, after lacking a permanent shepherd since January 2019. Father Stephen Chow Sau-yan, who most recently served as provincial of the Chinese Province of the Society of Jesus, was ordained a bishop in Hong Kong’s Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception on Dec. 4.

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Cuban-American bishops state solidarity with Cuba protests

July 13, 2021 Catholic News Agency 0
People demonstrate, some holding Cuban flags, during a protest against the Cuban government at Versailles Restaurant in Miami, on July 12, 2021. – Havana on Monday blamed a US “policy of economic suffocation” for unprecedented protests against Cuba’s communist government as Washington pointed the finger at “decades of repression” in the one-party state. Credit: Eva Marie Uzcategui/AFP via Getty Images.

Denver Newsroom, Jul 13, 2021 / 20:01 pm (CNA).

Four Cuban-American bishops issued a statement Tuesday indicating their support for Cubans seeking recognition of their human rights, following protest’s of the island’s communist government.

“We, Cuban-American bishops, join in solidarity with the Cuban people in their quest for responses to their human rights and needs.  We are deeply troubled by the aggressive reaction of the government to the peaceful manifestations, recognizing that ‘violence engenders violence,’” read the July 13 statement.

“Such a reaction seems to negate the basic Cuban principle of having ‘una patria con todos y para el bien de todos’ (a homeland with all and for the good of all).  We stand in solidarity with those detained because they have voiced their opinions.”

The statement was signed by Archbishop Nelson Perez of Philadelphia; Bishop Felipe Estevez of St. Augustine; Bishop Manuel Cruz, Auxiliary Bishop of Newark; and Bishop Octavio Cisneros, Auxiliary Bishop Emeritus of Brooklyn.

Archbishop Perez was born in Miami to Cuban emigrants, while Bishops Estevez, Cruz, and Cisneros were all born in Cuba.

Protests took place across Cuba July 11-12. Protesters cited concerns about inflation, shortages of food and medicine, and the Covid-19 pandemic.

Some protesters were beaten, and at least 100 were arrested. Among the arrested was Father Castor Álvarez, a priest of the Archdiocese of Camagüey.

The Cuban-American bishops said the protesters’ “chant of ‘Libertad’ underscores their desire for every Cuban citizen to enjoy basic human rights, as recognized as part of our human dignity by the United Nations, and defended for centuries by the Catholic Church in its social teaching.”

“As Cubans and as bishops of the Catholic Church in the United States, we are ever-mindful of the constant suffering and frustration of our brothers and sisters on the Island. We recognize that, while hundreds of thousands have experienced the need to emigrate, in order to enjoy basic human rights and a future filled with possibilities, those who have not – by choice or inability to do so – as Cubans in Cuba, are to be the actors of their own future and aspirations. The right and courage of the people in Cuba to raise their voice publicly, casting away their fear of repression and revealing authentic solidarity as a people, are acknowledged and applauded.”

The bishops called on “governments and all charitable organizations to collaborate in assisting in this urgent humanitarian crisis for the sake of the suffering people of Cuba, especially the sick and the poor. We commend the care of Caritas Cubana, as it continues to mediate – with ever so limited resources – a response to the basic human needs of the people of the Island.”

“As always, together with our brother-bishops in Cuba, and our brothers and sisters inside and outside the Island. We continue to place our trust in the motherly gaze of the patroness of Cuba, Our Lady of Charity,” they concluded.

Communist rule in Cuba was established soon after the conclusion of the Cuban Revolution in 1959, which ousted the authoritarian ruler Fulgencio Batista.


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Disability cannot be grounds for voluntary euthanasia, UN officials say

January 27, 2021 CNA Daily News 0

Washington D.C., Jan 27, 2021 / 04:17 pm (CNA).- A disability rights organization praised United Nations human rights experts for condemning voluntary euthanasia on the basis of disability.

 

On Monday, three UN human rights experts issued a joint statement condemning the “growing trend” of countries that extend legal assisted suicide to people who have disabilities, but who do not have a terminal condition. 

 

They added that a disability “should never be a ground or justification to end someone’s life directly or indirectly, and that a government “[u]nder no circumstance” should help “a person with a disabling condition who is not dying to terminate their life.”

 

In response, Diane Coleman, president of the disability rights organization Not Dead Yet, praised the decision of UN officials. 

 

“Every major U.S. national disability group that has taken a position on assisted suicide laws opposes them for the very compelling reasons expressed by the United Nations Office of Human Rights,” Coleman told CNA on Wednesday. 

 

Throughout parts of western Europe, it is legal for a disabled person who is not terminally ill to request and receive euthanasia. Canada is currently considering Bill C-7, which would permit those who do not have a “reasonably foreseeable” death to receive euthanasia. 

 

Coleman praised the UN officials for defending the dignity of persons with disabilities.

 

“As the statement says, ‘Disability should never be a ground or justification to end someone’s life directly or indirectly,’ and we strongly agree,” she told CNA.

 

Coleman noted that the statement did not mention that the terminally ill who seek to end their lives “primarily request assisted suicide because of disability-related concerns” such as the loss of autonomy.  

 

“People with advanced terminal conditions are a subset of all people with disabilities,” said Coleman. “So I really think that the concerns raised by the U.N. Office of Human Rights apply across the board.”

 

The three UN experts who issued the joint statement are Gerard Quinn, Special Rapporteur on the rights of persons with disabilities; Olivier De Schutter, Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights; and Claudia Mahler, Independent Expert on the enjoyment of all human rights by older persons. 

 

The UN’s human rights office said that bills extending euthanasia to persons with disabilities “would institutionalize and legally authorize ableism.”

 

Quinn, De Schutter, and Mahler warned that normalizing euthanasia for persons with disabilities who are not terminally ill would draw upon “ableist assumptions about the inherent ‘quality of life’ or ‘worth’ of the life of a person with a disability.” 

 

“These assumptions, which are grounded in ableism and associated stereotypes, have been decisively rejected by the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities,” they said. “Disability is not a burden or a deficit of the person. It is a universal aspect of the human condition.”

 

Canada’s Bill C-7 was introduced in the country’s Parliament following the Quebec Superior Court’s 2019 ruling that the requirement of a “reasonably foreseeable death” to receive euthanasia was a violation of rights under the country’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms. 

 

The two plaintiffs in the case, Jean Truchon and Nicole Gladu, were both diagnosed with disabling conditions that are not terminal. Truchon received euthanasia in April, 2020. 

 

All countries with legal active euthanasia—where a doctor can legally end a patient’s life at their request—have ratified the 2006 UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, or its optional protocol. 

 

The three experts also said that the elderly or disabled “may feel subtly pressured to end their lives prematurely” on account of “attitudinal barriers as well as the lack of appropriate services and support.” 

 

Poverty, too, plays a role, as “the proportion of people with disabilities living in poverty is significantly higher” than those without disabilities, they said.

 

“People with disabilities condemned to live in poverty due to the lack of adequate social protection can decide to end their lives as a gesture of despair,” they said. “Set against the legacy of accumulated disadvantages their ‘architecture of choice’ could hardly be said to be unproblematic.”


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