| Chen Pokong |
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Chen Pokong
An interview with democracy activist Chen Pokong
China Rights Forum, Spring 1997
Chen Pokong was one of the main organizers of the 1986 student movement in Shanghai that demanded human rights, democracy and political reform. After completing a master's degree in industrial management at Shanghai's Tongji University, he began teaching in the economics department at Guangzhou's Zhongshan University in 1987. During the 1989 democracy movement, he was not only an active participant, but one of the most important organizers and leaders of the protests in the Guangdong area. He is now in the United States as a visiting scholar at Columbia University. Wang Yu talked to him recently in New York.
Wang Yu: Your detailed and careful findings on the use of prison labor in China to manufacture export goods sparked a strong reaction when you made them known to the outside world. Many business people broke off their contracts with China immediately and there were even some people abroad who initiated a boycott of such goods. Would you discuss this matter a bit?
Chen Pokong: I was one of the main leaders of the 1989 student movement in Guangzhou. I had two positions: consultant to the Guangdong Provincial Post-Secondary Patriotic Students Union and chairman of the Patriotic Students Union at Zhongshan University. I wrote many of the documents that the movement issued. After "June Fourth," I was put on the most wanted list along with four other people and in August I was arrested and sentenced to three years imprisonment for the crime of "counterrevolutionary propaganda and incitement." Even before I was convicted, I was forced to do labor inside the detention center. I made handicrafts including jewelry, accessories, lanterns and artificial flowers. From the labels on these goods I noticed that not only was the brand name written in English, but the prices were in American dollars. I guessed that the goods we were producing must be for export. I was aware that the detention center was breaking international law by doing this, but under the circumstances there was no way for me to get the news out. This was the situation with prison labor during my first imprisonment.
My second arrest occurred in September of 1993. I was detained for two months before being sentenced to two years of Reeducation Through Labor and sent to Company 9 of the Guangzhou Number One Reeducation Through Labor Camp. This was an extremely harsh place located in a remote mountainous region outside of Guangzhou. During the day we would work on the docks loading stones for transport by ship. In the evening we would make artificial flowers in our prison cells. The flowers that we produced were all for export. In this Reeducation camp, our workload was heavy and we labored for long hours; it was extremely harsh. But working on the docks and having some contact with the boatmen gave me the opportunity to get this news out. In February 1993, I put together some materials about the export products including some English labels and used this route and friends to help get them out of the country. In October of 1993, the foreign media reported the Chinese government's use of prison labor to produce foreign export goods.
Wang: It was very dangerous for you to do what you did at the time. Why did you take this risk? And what made you have the idea to do it the way you did?
Chen: My situation at the time was really hopeless. My health was bad and I could not get treatment. Figuring that I was going to die anyway, I made a decision to go for broke and expose the illegal use of prison labor in China.
Of course I did wonder about the consequences. I thought there were two possible outcomes. The first was that my sentence could be lengthened and I might even be beaten to death. The other possibility was that they might feel some misgivings and could actually reduce my sentence. In the end, my treatment improved in late 1994 and in March of 1995, I was released five months early. Later I learned that due to my revelations, many foreign businesses had canceled their contracts and this caused great losses. Inside the labor camp as well I had gradually managed to gain some support and was planing to organize a strike. Perhaps the authorities got wind of this and decided that I was too dangerous and figured it would be better to let me out a little early.
Wang: I know that you once escaped to Hong Kong but after being denied political asylum you returned to mainland China. Was your second arrest for attempting to escape to Hong Kong?
Chen: The first time I was arrested I served three years and was released in 1992 after completing my entire sentence. After Deng Xiaoping's tour through the south that year, things were a bit more relaxed politically and I circulated some magazines from abroad expounding democracy among my friends. I also edited a pamphlet. It was called "Economic News," but there was quite a bit of political discussion in it.
In 1993, I was questioned by public security officers. Fearing that I would be arrested again, I escaped to Hong Kong. I was captured the minute I set foot over the border and taken to the entry office where I made my request for political asylum. It was denied and I was returned to Guangzhou five days later. It was only later that I discovered that many of my personal documents had not been returned to me, including my identity card, my working papers and my appeal letter and verdict statement. I had taken these documents with me to Hong Kong in preparation for applying for political asylum. It was really troublesome to be without an identification card or working papers and I hid for several months before escaping to Hong Kong again in August. My intention this time was to get my documents back as well as to reapply for political asylum. But in the end not only did I fail to retrieve my papers, but I was deported once again. I was sent back to Shenzhen on September 1, 1993, and was arrested immediately because my picture was on the wanted list.
Wang: You were incarcerated twice. Once you were held in a detention center, another time in a Reeducation camp. Both places were terrible of course, but it seems that the conditions in the labor camp were worse, is that right?
Chen: For two-and-a-half years of the first three-year sentence, I was locked in a six-meter square, unlit, damp prison cell with several criminal prisoners. The prisoners locked up with me came and went, but I stayed there all along. The conditions in the detention center were very bad. First of all, not getting any sunshine for two-and-a-half years and eating very poorly seriously harmed my health.
Second, I was put to work making export goods from the moment I entered the detention center. I had access to many prohibited materials. The detention center had a rule that no metal objects could be brought in because they feared the prisoners could use them to commit suicide. But when it came to manufacturing goods, they didn't care what was prohibited or not and metal materials got into our hands. One prisoner from Changsha killed himself by swallowing some jewelry.
Third, prisoners were frequently beaten. I was beaten severely three times. I was beaten for asking to read a newspaper. The third beating lasted for half an hour and I was seriously injured. I filed a complaint with the Guangzhou Procuratorate and they sent someone to make a medical appraisal and I was sent to the hospital for treatment. They informed me that the guard had been disciplined and assured me that I would not be beaten again. From then until my release in 1992, I was never beaten again.
The second imprisonment in a Reeducation camp was truly dreadful. First, we had to work very hard for long hours. During the day we carried stones at the docks for eight hours. We had to run as we loaded them onto the boats. Guards would chase after us hitting us with a stick so that we could never slow down at all. People would often be injured by dropping stones while trying to rush. One time, my entire fingernail was smashed off and I was still not allowed to rest. In the evening we made artificial flowers. We were not allowed to rest for a moment then, either. If you stopped you would be beaten by a guard. We worked at least 14 hours every day, seven days a week. There was no Sunday. There were only three days a year that we didn't work: Spring Festival, New Year's and October 1.
Second, the beatings were serious. If you slowed in your work even slightly, you would immediately be beaten or kicked or even hit with stones. There would always be seven or eight people beating up a single prisoner and they didn't stop until the prisoner had been beaten to the ground, sometimes even unconscious. There were people beaten to death every year. Whenever someone was beaten to death a prisoner was made to take the blame. The guards never had to bear legal responsibility.
Third, the food was unbelievably bad. The rice was as coarse as it could be and the vegetables rotten. We only had a small bit of meat once every two months. The water we drank was from a river and extremely dirty. When we were working, we weren't even allowed to drink this water for fear that we would delay the work. The sun in the south is very strong and hot; there's nothing worse than not being allowed to drink anything. This caused some long-lasting effects on my health: I am constantly thirsty and I have a nervous condition; I feel tense and have trouble concentrating; and I suffer from digestive problems.
Fourth, there were no pastimes whatsoever. Although the regulations state that there should be some forms of entertainment allowed in prisons, there were none. If a person tried to do anything to amuse himself, he would be beaten.
Wang: I've heard that you have an interest in literature and you've even published some fiction and poetry as well as essays and books. You must have written a great deal during your years in the detention center and the labor camp. Did you bring any of it out with you?
Chen: I have always loved literature and loved to write. Before the 1989 democracy movement, I published short stories in several literary magazines.
The first time I was released, they confiscated eight notebooks in which I had written notes, stories and poems. The second time I was released, they also held on to six of my notebooks. This time I lodged a complaint with the Guangzhou Intermediate Court. Only after submitting a written complaint were my notebooks returned to me. But the eight notebooks confiscated earlier were never returned. These notebooks were my personal property and according to Chinese law, private property is a sacrosanct right that can not be violated. But what can you do when the people enforcing the law don't obey the law?
In 1995, I published a collection of poems in Guangzhou. Since people who are deprived of their political rights are not allowed to publish, I could not use my real name and wrote under a penname.
Wang: You are an economist, so the last question I would like to ask you is about what impact you think economic reforms can have on the human rights situation in a society?
Chen: Merely expanding the economy and improving economic conditions can not change a society's human rights situation. Only by obtaining democratic political rights can all other rights, including human rights, be guaranteed. The reasons are very simple: even if the economy is flourishing, when policy differences arise between business and government, labor and business, or labor and government due to economic interests, how can the masses contend with the government when they have no political rights? How can the masses protect their own rights?
Wang Yu is the editor of the Chinese section of China Rights Forum.