China jails teacher for net essay

BBC News
March 17, 2006

A Chinese teacher has been jailed for 10 years for an internet essay claiming people had a right to end tyranny by violent means, a rights group said.

Ren Zhiyuan's trial, for his essay the Road to Democracy, highlighted China's mounting crackdown on dissent.

It came as subversion charges against a Chinese researcher for the New York Times, Zhao Yan, were dropped.

Analysts said the case threatened to tarnish an upcoming visit to the US by China's President Hu Jintao.

Ren Zhiyuan, 27, pleaded not guilty to charges of "subversion of state power".

His lawyer, Zhang Chengmao, said his client would appeal the sentence.

"I do know that whatever Ren Zhiyuan wrote was totally within the scope of free expression," Zhang told Reuters news agency. "He was a teacher who had his own ideas, but he never acted on those ideas."

Ren had posted an essay called "The Road to Democracy" which argued that people had the right to violently overthrow tyranny, according to the New York-based Human Rights in China.

His sentencing appeared to contradict comments by government official Liu Zhengrong last month, who said that no one had been arrested just for writing online content.

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