Bush Hosts 3 Chinese Rights Activists

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS | The New York Times
11 May 2006

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush welcomed to the White House three human rights activists from China, including one whose Internet blog was blocked by Chinese authorities after it was nominated for two top international awards.

The three -- author Yu Jie, law professor and blogger Wang Yi and legal scholar Li Baiguang -- are active in China's underground Protestant churches, which have been hit for months by a government crackdown in which many movement leaders have been arrested.

Such underground Chinese churches, both Protestant and Roman Catholic, are known as house churches, a reference to their use of private homes for services instead of government-monitored churches.

Bush raised the fate of the house movement with Chinese President Hu Jintao when he visited Beijing in November. He said afterward, ''A society which recognizes religious freedom is a society which will recognize political freedom as well.''

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