Group warns China on website shutdown

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By Robin Kwong in Hong Kong

Published: June 25 2008 03:31 | Last updated: June 25 2008 03:31

The Chinese government’s recent crackdown on civil rights groups may backfire and incite protests during the Beijing Olympics, warned Lu Jun, who ran a popular website for hepatitis B carriers shut down last month.

Beijing blocked access within China to “In the Hepatitis B Camp,” a popular website and online forum for carriers of the virus and which was the world’s biggest such forum with over 300,000 members. China’s 120m carriers of the virus are widely discriminated against by companies, universities and some government departments, even though the virus cannot be spread through casual contact.

Mr Lu, who heads a rights group that has helped carriers sue companies such as IBM and Foxconn for discrimination, said the website was a gathering place for sufferers who had little other opportunity to vent their frustrations or find support from doctors and fellow patients. By shutting it down, the Chinese government risked pushing patients to take drastic actions, Mr Lu said.

“A common refrain in the messages we have received from members since the website was shut down is: ‘I love my country but my country doesn’t love me’,” Mr Lu said.

“In the Hepatitis B Camp” was first shut down by the government last November. On Tuesday Mr Lu said an official had told him at the time that the closure was due to the upcoming Olympic Games. Mr Lu managed to reopen the website by moving it to an overseas server, but Beijing last month began blocking access to the website within China, just 10 days after government officials participated in an event for World Hepatitis Day at the Great Wall.

Mr Lu said his website’s members were shocked and angry, with one communist party member writing to him saying that “for the first time, I am having anti-party feelings”.

“Some members have mooted the idea of protesting during the Olympics but I have not heard any concrete plans so far. They would keep the plans very secret, I think,” he added.

Mr Lu filed a complaint with the Ministry of Information, but that has yet to yield any reply. He is considering mounting a signature campaign, applying for permission to protest, or even suing the Ministry of Information if the site is not unblocked.

The officials who shut the website down “are destroying social harmony, creating divisions and casting shame on China”, Mr Lu said.

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2008