Netizens Mourning Nobel Laureate Liu Xiaobo Face Chinese Censorship

On social media, including Weibo and WeChat, researchers documented a significant increase in censorship after Liu Xiaobo’s death.

A new art site for Liu Xiaobo in Sydney University Graffiti Tunnel. Credit: @badiucao

The ashes of the late Chinese democracy advocate and literary critic Liu Xiaobo were buried at sea near Dalian city in northeast China on July 15, two days after he died of liver failure.

In interviews with Hong Kong television outlets, Liu’s brother, Liu Xiaoguang, expressed “great thanks and appreciation to the Chinese Communist party” for Liu’s cancer treatment and funeral arrangement.

But Liu’s supporters believe that the he was buried at sea to prevent people in China from paying tribute to the Nobel laureate at his grave.

In fact, most of Liu’s friends could not attend the funeral. While his wife, Liu Xia, had appeared on photos of his funeral and sea burial, she has lost touch with her friends.

Liu had been sentenced to 11 years in prison in 2009 for “inciting subversion of state power” for his involvement in Charter 08, a manifesto that called for democratic reforms in China. He won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2010 for his human rights work.

On social media, including Weibo and WeChat, researchers documented a significant increase in censorship after Liu’s death. According to Toronto-based digital rights research group Citizen Lab, discussions of Liu and his work are no longer tolerated.

On Facebook, Hong Kong academic and Citizen Lab researcher Lokman Tsui summarised the group’s findings:

“For WeChat, before his death, discussion of Liu was allowed as long as it did not touch on certain sensitive topics such as “Charter 08” or his medical care. After his death, any mention of his name in English and Chinese (both simplified and traditional) is enough to get messages blocked. His death is also the first time we see image filtering in one-to-one chat, in addition to image filtering in group chats and WeChat Moments [which is equivalent to Facebook’s news feed].

For Sina Weibo, there already was a ban on searches for Liu’s name in English and Chinese (both simplified and traditional). However, after his death, his given name (Xiaobo) alone is enough to trigger censorship, showing increased censorship on the platform and a recognition that his passing is a particularly sensitive event. Nevertheless, there is also evidence suggesting there continues to be genuine user interest in producing and finding Liu-related content using alternative keywords.”

For the first time, image-sharing was blocked in one-on-one chat. Left: A Canadian user sends a picture of a politically symbolic chair image to a friend in China. Right: The recipient does not see the chair. Credit: Screenshots by Citizen Lab.

The research team believes that censorship is rising due to “the authorities’ fear for the potential of collective action” on the one hand, and as a tactic to “save face or avoid embarrassment” on the other.

Liu’s death is a politically sensitive event for the Chinese Communist Party, as Liu was considered one of the most moderate Chinese dissidents because of his deeply-held commitment to non-violent struggle.

He participated in the 1989 Tiananmen Square pro-democracy protests, persuaded the students to retreat when the military troops moved in and stayed with them until the last moment. Instead of leaving the country, he received a two-year prison sentence and continued to advocate for peaceful political transformation in China.

He returned to prison years later for being one of the authors behind Charter 08. In his most famous speech, which he sought to read at his trial (but was prohibited from doing so), he declared “I have no enemies and no hatred.”

The Chinese Communist Party had kept Liu’s physical condition a secret until late June 2017 when Liu’s lawyer publicly confirmed that he was on medical parole for late-stage liver cancer treatment.

Since then, an international campaign calling for Liu and his wife’s freedom picked up momentum.

Lotte Leicht, the EU director for Human Rights Watch, urged:

Dear @KofiAnnan, fellow #Nobel laureate #LiuXiaobo is dying.
He has one last wish.
Pls help; urge #China‘s Gov to let him & wife #LiuXia go pic.twitter.com/HxEcEormMU

— Lotte Leicht (@LotteLeicht1) July 11, 2017

This article was originally published by Global Voices.