But far less known is the brutal, and intensifying, repression of China’s Christians. For while the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) regime has always repressed religion in general, Christianity has always been its biggest target. This is partly a result of the Party’s promotion of atheism, as well its nervousness towards any gathering of people that it does not control. But it is also rooted in its fear that Christianity represents a “foreign” threat to its way of life, albeit one that the CCP hasn’t quite worked out how to deal with.

Under Mao Zedong, the Party attempted to eliminate Christianity altogether, though it succeeded only in driving the church underground. Indeed, as Deng Xiaoping started to open up the economy in the 1980s, the regime realised that the Church could not be eradicated so sought to control it instead; re-establishing state-approved church institutions for Catholics and Protestants that had been shut during the Cultural Revolution, while continuing to persecute underground congregations.

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There then followed a period of varied relaxation in which, while there was never religious freedom, the situation for some Christians did improve, depending on the attitudes of provincial authorities. Some local leaders turned a blind-eye to gatherings of unregistered churches, as long as they did not directly challenge the CCP. In other places, even large unregistered “mega churches” were permitted; Beijing’s Zion Church operated for years with hundreds of worshippers, while the Golden Lampstand Church in Shanxi province attracted a staggering 50,000 members.

But now China is in a fourth era — one of severe repression, propaganda and central control. Since he became President in 2013, Xi Jinping has taken an active interest in policy on religion, and initiated several national-level conferences dedicated to its “Sinicisation”. They culminated in the introduction of new regulations in 2018; today, even churches within the state-controlled institutions face new restrictions. Officially, the regime estimates that there are 50 million Christians in China today, though the real figure is believed to be at least double that number.

Every church is now forced to demonstrate its loyalty to the CCP by displaying portraits of Xi Jinping and party propaganda banners alongside, or even instead of, religious images. Surveillance cameras are installed at the altar, recording all who attend, while under-18s are prohibited from going into places of worship at all. Meanwhile, Christians on low incomes have been pressured by officials to give up their faith, with threats that their state support could be withheld.

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Most dramatically, thousands of crosses have been torn down and some churches have not only been closed, but demolished. In 2018 alone, the Golden Lampstand Church was dynamited, Zion Church was forced to close and the Home of Christ Church in Shantou, Guangdong province, was shut after the authorities called it an “illegal religious organisation”.

Christmas and the Bible are now in the regime’s sights, too. In 2019, the CCP announced its intention to produce a new translation of the Bible, which would bring it into line with the party’s “thought” by reinterpreting key passages. Last Christmas, they banned all festive activities, with the exception of attending government-sanctioned churches and family gatherings at home. Even so, groups of so-called “Pro-Mao” citizens reportedly marched through the streets in subsequent days, proclaiming anti-Christian messages. Some universities prohibited students from celebrating the holiday and banned them from attending off-campus events.

But in many ways, the CCP regards Christianity as an external threat — as a “foreign” force intent on undermining the country’s way of life. We can see this in the publication last November of a new draft document on regulations for foreigners’ involvement in religious activities. In effect, the new measures prohibit Chinese religious adherents from participating in activities organised by foreigners in China, and criminalise proselytisation — or even religious education and training — completely.

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This wariness towards Christianity’s “foreign” elements partly explains why in Hong Kong, where the rule of law is being dismantled by the CCP, religious freedom is particularly under pressure. Consider the case of pastor Roy Chan, whose Good Neighbour North District Church was raided by police last year, an act of retaliation for Chan’s decision to support young pro-democracy protestors. “Beat me, not the kids,” Chan said at the time. And he was beaten — not just by the police but by HSBC which, under pressure from the authorities, have frozen the assets of the church, pastor Chan, and his family.

But while some religious leaders in in the city continue to speak out against this crackdown, others, including Hong Kong’s current Apostolic Administrator, Cardinal John Tong, are not showing similar courage. When the President of the Federation of Asian Bishops Conferences Cardinal Charles Bo tried to mobilise a prayer campaign for Hong Kong last year, the diocese actively discouraged it. A few weeks later, Cardinal Tong issued an instruction to clergy to “watch your language” in homilies, and the diocese has since published religious textbooks with guidance on how Hong Kong students can “contribute to their nation” — a clear pro-Beijing slant. Whether it wants to or not, the diocese is undoubtedly feeling — or at least anticipating — the CCP’s pressure.

Yet none of this dissuaded the Vatican from renewing its two-year-old agreement with the regime in China over the appointment of bishops in September 2020. First negotiated in 2018, the text of the agreement remains secret but it essentially allows the Chinese Communist Party to nominate bishops, for final approval by the Pope. In the Vatican’s mind, the aim was to better protect Catholics in China and bring the state-approved and underground churches together, but it has had the opposite effect.

Even when it was first mooted, a precondition for the deal should have been the release of all imprisoned Catholic clergy, at a minimum. Instead, not only was that not secured, but several brave underground Catholic bishops who had stayed loyal to Rome for decades, who had been in and out of prison or risked arrest many times, were forced by Rome to stand aside in favour of Beijing’s preferred bishops.

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Only two months after the deal was announced, bishop Peter Shao Zhumin of Wenzhou, was arrested for the fifth time in two years. He was released, but continues to face harassment. Meanwhile, in January last year, Bishop Vincent Guo Xijin of Mindong, Fujian Province, who had already been demoted to the position of auxiliary bishop to make way for a Beijing-appointed prelate, was forced by the authorities to leave his residence, which was then shut down. The 61-year-old cleric ended up sleeping in the doorway of his church office and only after an international outcry was he permitted to return to his apartment, albeit with the utilities cut off. Then in June 2020, 70-year-old Augustine Cui Tai, coadjutor bishop of the underground church in Xuanhua, was arrested again — having already endured 13 years in detention. Since then, there have been countless others like him.

And so as the world rightly focuses more on China, on accusations of genocide against the Uighurs and breaches of an international treaty in Hong Kong, we must not forget the images of dynamited churches, destroyed crosses, Communist propaganda in holy sanctuaries and jailed priests.

Wang Yi, the pastor of Early Rain Church in Chengdu, warned over two years ago that the regime had launched “a war against the soul”. A year later he was sentenced to nine years in prison for “inciting to subvert state power”. But as Pastor Wang made clear in his one of his offending sermons: the CCP has “established for themselves an enemy that can never be detained, can never be destroyed, will never capitulate nor be conquered: the soul of man.”

“Antisemitism, or any hate, become dangerous when three things happen. First: when it moves from the fringes of politics to a mainstream party and its leadership. Second: when the party sees that its popularity with the general public is not harmed thereby. And three: when those who stand up and protest are vilified and abused for doing so.”

He concluded:

“All three factors exist in Britain now. I never thought I would see this in my lifetime. That is why I cannot stay silent. For it is not only Jews who are at risk. So too is our humanity.”

He’s right about the rising tide of religious and racial intolerance, fuelled by populism from the far-Right and the far-Left. It’s driven by a mix of factors and manifests itself in the form of identity politics, religious nationalism and extremism. The result is discrimination and persecution.

The intolerance is widespread. Few places are untouched. Here is an illustrative but by no means exhaustive run through:

In Burma, mainstream democratic politicians pander to militant Buddhist nationalists, resulting in a genocide of Muslims. In Indonesia, moderate Muslim politicians play the religion card and flirt with ultra-conservative clerics. India is led by a Hindu nationalist with a record of stoking hatred of religious minorities.

In Pakistan, where the notorious blasphemy laws have been a source of grave injustice for four decades, the new prime minister Imran Khan, on first appearance no extremist, is bolstering his religious credentials in ways which do not counter intolerance. On 7 July this year, at a rally of Muslim leaders, he promised to defend the blasphemy laws.

Further reading

Who's pulling the Pakistan prime minister's strings?

By James M. Dorsey

In Sudan, religious leaders continue to face criminal charges for resisting illegal but officially sanctioned seizures of church property. And in parts of the Philippines, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Turkey, Egypt, Iran and of course Iraq and Syria, religious minorities continue to suffer.

Such intolerance is on the rise not only in countries where extremists from the majority religion have influence, but in countries which are officially atheist. In China, Xi Jinping’s regime has launched a crackdown on religion that has fallen upon Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, Daoists and practitioners of the spiritual movement known as Falun Gong. Churches have been closed or demolished, hundreds of crosses torn down, bibles confiscated or destroyed, and children under the age of 18 banned from going to religious services.

In some parts of the country, Christians have been forced to take down paintings of Jesus Christ and replace them with portraits of Xi. In China’s western region of Xinjiang, it is reported that one million Muslims are now in ‘re-education camps’, taken away without warning simply for reading the Qu’ran, praying, abstaining from pork or alcohol, or wearing ‘Islamic’ dress.

So bad is the repression that Human Rights Watch published a detailed report – Eradicating Ideological Viruses: China’s Campaign of Repression Against Xinjiang’s Muslims – and the United Nations has spoken out.

Vietnam’s Communist regime is also pursuing a campaign of persecution against its minorities, pressurising them to recant their faith, forcing eviction, denying access to public services; there is arbitrary detention, imprisonment, beatings, torture and sexual abuse. Defenders of religious freedom, such as Pastor Nguyen Trung Ton and the Hoa Hao Buddhist and legal expert Nguyen Bac Truyen, are in prison, and there are reports of deaths from torture and ill-treatment in custody.

Further reading

Why does the Pope trot out antisemitic tropes?

By Giles Fraser

In North Korea there is absolutely no freedom of religion or belief at all. Anyone who fails to demonstrate anything other than absolute, unwavering loyalty to the ruling Kim dynasty is punished severely; Christians face a lifetime in prison camp and in some cases execution.

In some countries, intolerance is driven by the government, while in others it is primarily non-state actors, but often with government complicity. In Indonesia, for example, the current president, Joko Widodo, is widely regarded as a defender of pluralism and a friend of minorities. Yet faced with re-election next year and an opponent, former General Prabowo Subianto, who is expected to play the religion card, President Widodo has chosen as his running mate a 75-year-old ultra-conservative Islamic cleric and head of the Indonesian Ulama Council, Ma’ruf Amin.

Human rights defenders are appalled at the choice, for Amin was responsible for the fatwa which landed the former governor of Jakarta, in jail on blasphemy charges. For Mr Widodo to pick for his vice-presidential candidate a man who was not only responsible for jailing the popular Christian governor, thereby delivering a hammer-blow to Indonesia’s reputation for pluralism, but one who also authored edicts restricting the construction of places of worship and the activities of Ahmadiyyas (a sect of Islam widely accused of heresy and persecuted by other Muslims), advocating the criminalisation of homosexuality, supporting female genital mutilation and promoting shari’a by-laws, is something of a setback for moderates in the world’s largest Muslim-majority nation.

Mr Widodo’s defenders will argue that his choice has neutralised the religion question. Nonetheless it is a sign of the times that he felt the need to bolster his religious credentials rather than stick to his true instincts as a pluralist.

Further reading

Aristotle's answer to identity politics

By Henry Olsen

Indonesia’s reputation for religious pluralism has been increasingly threatened over the past two decades. The Ahmadiyya have faced periodic violence and restrictions throughout the country, and on the island of Lombok hundreds of Ahmadis are living in displacement camps because their homes were destroyed in violence.

On 13 May this year, three Christian churches in Surabaya were attacked by islamic suicide bombers within minutes of each other. Shockingly the bombers all belonged to one family: the parents had strapped explosives to their daughters, aged six and eight, and their teenage sons. At least 13 people were killed, and dozens injured. Against this backdrop, blasphemy laws continue to be misused, most recently in the case of a Buddhist woman in North Sumatra, jailed for 18 months simply for asking a mosque to turn down the volume on its loudspeakers.

Religious intolerance and violent extremism are not the same, but as the Wahid Foundation’s Alamsyah M Dja’far told me, “if intolerance increases, the threat of radicalism increases, and that will change the face of Indonesia”. It’s happening already. I was told this month of a Muslim man who asked his 12 year-old son what he had learned at school that day. “We learned about ‘kafir’ [‘infidel’],” his son replied. When his father asked what they had learned about infidels, his son replied simply: “We learned that they must be killed.”

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By Julie Bindel

Such anecdotes are reinforced by footage showing marching children at a kindergarten in east Java, dressed in black robes and niqabs, wielding assault rifle replicas, with the theme “Fight with the Messenger of Allah to Increase Faith and Piety”. As Reverend Gomar Gultom, General Secretary of the Communion of Churches of Indonesia, told me, “the seed of radicalisation has spread throughout Indonesia”.

At its most extreme, intolerance leads to ethnic cleansing, crimes against humanity and genocide, as we have seen in Burma. When I visited the refugee camps on the Bangladesh-Burma border in March almost everyone I talked to had seen loved ones raped or killed and villages burned.

I met Rohingyas whose eyes had been shot out and limbs blown off. “The Burma army was trying to drive us out of our land,” said Saiful, a young student from Maungdaw who escaped over the mountains. “They made it impossible for us to stay – how could we survive?” My abiding memory, though, is of 16-year-old Khalida, lying paralysed on the floor of her bamboo hut.  She had been shot multiple times in her leg, and was unable even to sit up.

“More than 300 Rohingyas in my village were killed by the Burma army in their attack,” she told me. “My father, two sisters and one brother were killed. My mother was also shot but survived.” Her 18 year-old brother, Mohamed Rafiq, fled their village before the military attacked, and discovered her among hundreds of bodies when he returned. They managed to flee to Bangladesh, where she could receive medical treatment.

Further reading

Why don't we care about Christians in the Middle East?

By Giles Fraser

It’s not only believers who are persecuted. Freedom of religion or belief, as detailed in Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, is a fundamental human right for everyone, of every belief and none, and it protects the freedom to not believe as much as the right to believe. Alexander Aan is an atheist jailed for his beliefs. After writing on Facebook that he did not believe in God, he ended up in jail. There are similar cases in many parts of the world, as the annual report of the International Humanist and Ethical Union details.

In our divided world, intolerance comes from every quarter – from religious extremists towards perceived heretics in their own religion, adherents of other religions, secularists, woman, the LGBT community and others; and from militant secularists and atheists, either in authoritarian regimes or within society, towards those of other beliefs. It comes from all directions – theological, ideological, political and socio-economic. Sometimes it is out of genuine, if narrow-minded, conviction, but more often it is mixed with political motivations, perhaps tied with conflicts over land, natural resources and influence. It tears families, nations and the world apart.

To counter it, we need to promote freedom of religion or belief for everyone, everywhere, and strengthen the mechanisms we have available for this. The United Nations has a Special Rapporteur for Freedom of Religion or Belief, Ahmed Shaheed; the European Union has a Special Envoy, Jan Figel; the United States has an Ambassador-at-Large, Sam Brownback; Britain has recently appointed the Minister of State at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, Lord Ahmad, as the Prime Minister’s Special Envoy on the issue; and countries such as Norway and Denmark have equivalent representatives.

Their roles must be supported, their influence strengthened. And we must strengthen initiatives to counter intolerance and extremism and promote dialogue wherever possible. There are various plans available already – agreed at gatherings at Rabat, Marrakech and Beirut for example – and they should be more widely implemented.

Further reading

The unlikely rise of China's 'boss Christians'

By Chloë Starr

All hope is not lost. There is still humanity amid the monstrosity. Within hours of the attacks on Surabaya, people of all faiths came to the churches to offer condolences and help clear up the wreckage. Such gestures took place across the nation. In Jakarta, two young Muslim women handed out roses to the congregation during mass at the Cathedral. It’s an important part of town. Jakarta’s Cathedral stands across the street from Indonesia’s largest Muslim place of worship, the Istiqlal Mosque: it’s symbolic of Indonesia’s pluralism.

In our world today, divided by political and religious tensions, we need to support those who will go to the place of worship of another faith with roses, not bombs. In so doing, we can overcome the hatreds of every stripe that are sweeping our globe. We need to open our doors to our neighbours. The titles of Jonathan Sacks’ books give us a nudge in the right direction: The Dignity of Difference; The Home We Build Together; To Heal A Fractured World. We should heed his hints.

What to make of it?

There are two extremes to avoid. On the one hand, there’s temptation to dismiss this as a stunt, a cynical public relations exercise, a manipulation by a regime that cannot be trusted. It’s tempting to do so, given the North Korean regime’s history of histrionics, followed by charm offensives, followed by broken promises. On the other hand, there’s the impulse to embrace it and to think it is a Gorbachev/Thatcher/Reagan moment, or an FW de Klerk/Mandela one. Both instincts would be wrong.

When it comes to the North Korean regime, I am a cynic. I have met too many escapees from the North Korean gulags, heard too many testimonies, read too many human rights reports and books, seen too many scars on the bodies of survivors to think that this is a regime that could be trusted. And that is my problem with what is going on – the atrocities committed by Kim Jong-Un and his father and grandfather are being conveniently swept under the carpet. They must not be.

The United Nations Commission of Inquiry has claimed that “the gravity, scale and nature” of the appalling human rights violations by North Korea’s regime “reveal a State that does not have any parallel in the contemporary world”. It has recommended that Kim Jong-Un’s crimes against humanity be called to account at the International Criminal Court.

Yet clearly, if an olive-branch is offered, however insincerely, it would be foolish to turn it away after 65 years of a state of war. President Moon Jae-in knows that. And he played his hand with dexterity. His footsy with Kim Jong-Un over the borderline was bizarrely charming. And the promise of people-to-people links and a peace treaty, an end to war and denuclearisation are hard to argue with.

For his next move, he should brush up on Ronald Reagan’s Berlin Wall speech. Speaking to the people of Berlin, Reagan said that American presidents come “because it’s our duty to speak, in this place, of freedom”. That message should never be lost in Seoul, Pyongyang, or Panmunjom. “Behind me stands a wall that encircles the free sectors of this city, part of a vast system of barriers that divides,” the President continued. He spoke of “a gash of barbed wire, concrete, dog runs and guard towers” that could perfectly describe North Korea today.

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As President von Weizsacker said, as long as such a divide remains, it affects “the question of freedom for all mankind”. That is why a resolution to the Korean question – as was the case with the German divide 31 years ago – revolves not so much around denuclearisation as around human dignity and freedom. It would be no good to give Mr Kim the impression that he can keep his prison camps if he gives up his nuclear weapons.

For as President Reagan said three decades ago:

“There stands before the entire world one great and inescapable conclusion: freedom leads to prosperity. Freedom replaces the ancient hatreds … Freedom is the victor … Freedom and security go together, that the advance of human liberty can only strengthen the cause of world peace.”

The message now to Mr Kim should be this: “Kim Jong-Un, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Korean peninsula, if you seek liberalisation: Come to the prison camps! Mr Kim, open the gates to the gulags! Mr Kim, tear down the walls of the gulags! Mr Kim, free all your political prisoners.”

Hearts have been hardened over six decades of war and oppression and separation, but here is an opportunity. It is clear that the North Koreans are interested in change, as a recent report by Christian Solidarity Worldwide concludes. The spread of information from outside into the ‘hermit nation’ has increased, has made a difference and should be increased.

Yet we must not be naïve either. For as long as anyone in North Korea is jailed, tortured or executed for holding a belief – political or religious – that differs from Kim Jong-Un’s, there cannot be peace on the Korean peninsula. Once he takes clear steps towards freedom of expression, freedom of the press, freedom of religion or belief, an end to the gulags, then we will know he means business. Until then, one can only conclude that the soundbites were good, the images were inspiring, but where is the substance? Only time will tell.

My experience helped shine a spotlight on the erosion of Hong Kong’s freedoms and autonomy, and on Xi Jinping’s intense repression of any and all dissent. Yet that campaign of repression takes far more serious forms for Chinese activists, in Hong Kong and the mainland, than anything I experienced. I suffered an unpleasant inconvenience, but within 24 hours I was safely home in London, able to see family and friends, and free to speak out. Those in Hong Kong and mainland China who challenge the Communist Party face a far graver fate.

In Hong Kong, in recent years, booksellers publishing exposes of Chinese leaders’ private lives or critiques of the regime have been abducted.

Pro-democracy elected legislators disqualified.

Student leaders of pro-democracy demonstrations have been jailed.

In mainland China, human rights lawyers, bloggers, religious leaders and dissidents are jailed or disappear – and are subjected to the most horrific forms of torture imaginable.

The scale of China’s brutality has been revealed in a new and unique 40-page report published last month. Unique not so much for what it documents – major international human rights organisations have been reporting China’s abuses for years. But unique in terms of who it is authored by. For the first time ever, a human rights commentary has been smuggled out of China by a human rights lawyer who is still living in China – and, furthermore, has now disappeared.

Gao Zhisheng is perhaps China’s best known human rights lawyer, and certainly one of its bravest. Known for defending Christians, Falun Gong practitioners and other vulnerable groups, Gao’s licence was revoked and his law firm closed down in 2006. He was then sentenced to three years in jail but given a five-year suspended sentence on probation, charged with incitement to subvert state power. During his probation period he was forcibly ‘disappeared’ at least six times. On one occasion he was held incommunicado and tortured for six weeks. He was then returned to prison for a further three years.

On 7 August 2014 Gao was released from prison, but in August this year he disappeared again. Somehow despite the Chinese state’s authoritarianism, he was able to compile an analysis of the regime’s human rights violations, drawing on information provided by what he calls “a petitioner in dark nights”. He covers a wide range of themes, from violations of freedom of expression and religious persecution to land rights and police brutality, and describes China as a “killing field”. China, under Xi Jinping is, he says, enduring “the harshest and most brutal political oppression since the end of Mao Zedong’s rule”.

Gao’s analysis could be criticised for hyperbole. People in North Korea or ISIS-controlled territory in Syria or Iraq, for example, may take issue with his suggestion that “the cruel reality of extreme hostility to human rights has made documenting human rights in China the most dangerous cause in the world”. Unfortunately too many places in the world could lay claim to that description. But allowances should be made for the polemical style. This is an analysis written by a man who has suffered intense physical and mental torture, separation from his family, constant surveillance and repeated arrests or disappearances, and yet still had the extraordinary courage not only to write such a comprehensive document but to find a way to get it out of the country. It deserves to be read and taken seriously.

Gao provides numerous shocking, graphic examples of police brutality:

• The wife of a church pastor buried alive by a bulldozer destroying the church building;
• The shooting of a petitioner by a police officer;
• The torture of human rights defenders;
• A pastor, Bao Guohua, has been jailed for fourteen years, and his wife for twelve years, for protesting at the destruction of church crosses in Zhejiang;
• When a political prisoner, Peng Ming, died in jail, his brain, heart and other organs were removed – to cover up the cause of death or, in the regime’s account, for “medical research”;
• One activist, Huang Yan, suffered two miscarriages as a result of being beaten up by police and she claimed that one officer “kneeled on my body, grabbed my hair and pounded my head on the ground until it was covered with blood”. Her husband was seized, forced to kneel down under the hot sun, and told to divorce her because she is “a dangerous person”. Denied medical treatment for cancer, she was then unable to walk as a result of torture. “They took all my dignity away,” she added. “The torture was indescribable. They put seven sets of chains on my hands and feet, and sent in male inmates to beat me.”

Another account, by a former party official Wang Qiuping, describes how “they beat up, tortured, abused, disable and deliberately harmed the bodies of people… Handcuffs, chains, helmets, masks, bullet-proof jackets, hanging and beating, pinching testicles with clips” and used other torture to extract confessions. He was knocked unconscious three times in 313 days. “To extract a confession, they wouldn’t let me sleep for 120 days”.

The case against China isn’t just anecdotal:

• China is ranked 176^th out of 180 countries in Reporters Without Borders’ index of press freedom.
• It is rated “the worst abuser of internet freedom” in the world by Freedom House[1.  Freedom House reports: “China was the world’s worst abuser of internet freedom in the 2016 Freedom on the Net survey for the second consecutive year. Harsh punishments for expression and a deteriorating legal environment are significantly undermining civil society activism on the internet.” And the repression appears to be working: “Against the backdrop of stricter internet control across all platforms, digital activism has been gradually waning. While some individuals are still outspoken, observers noted a decline in the lively discussion of social causes which used to characterize popular microblogs.”].
• And the Committee to Protect Journalists records that it is the world’s second most active jailer of reporters[2. Turkey put most journalists (81) behind bars in the latest year – according to the New York-based Cttee to Protect Journalists – but China was in second place, with Egypt third.].

Gao describes how his own relatives have been hounded, their identity cards revoked. “The brutal persecution of my in-laws is just a snapshot of the … severe abuse of human dignity and basic human rights,” he says. Yet despite everything he has personally experienced, Gao himself is astonished at the scale of the brutality of Xi Jinping’s regime:

“I still can’t help but wonder when I’m documenting these human rights violations: can this be true? In today’s world and at this stage of human civilization, such a brutal and ruthless regime still exists – in China, in the 21st century.”

And he holds the international community complicit for its silence:

“The Communist Party of China has successfully terrorised and deterred the whole world with the enormous economic interests generated by the blood, sweat and labour of the poor people in China. The whole world has learned to be deaf and mute to [the] ruthless suppression of the Chinese people’s basic human rights, in exchange for the bloodstained economic interests … They allow economic interests to dictate their choices and the butchers get what they desire.”

The regime’s “dream world” is, he argues, one in which all dissent is silenced – but such a world, he adds, is “a dead world”. The regime wants a world “in which people are unanimous on everything”, because “the slightest difference looks very obvious and unpleasant to the controlling government”. But this “impulse to suppress or even eradicate such differences generates more conflicts”.

Gao’s work is a challenge to us all. It deserves to be read in the corridors of power. He has acted with extraordinary courage and is paying a very high price for his conscience. It is time for the rest of the world to rediscover its conscience, stand up to China and, at a minimum, demand Gao’s release.

Yet while my experience was unpleasant, unnecessary, unjustified and inconvenient, I was unharmed. I flew back to Bangkok, and from there back to London. I can see my family and friends again, and I can speak out freely. Chinese critics of the Communist Party face an altogether far graver threat.

Two years ago today, Gui Minhai, a bookseller and publisher in Hong Kong, disappeared while on holiday in Thailand. Gui, born in China but a Swedish citizen, ran Causeway Bay Books along with four colleagues, publishing and selling works critical of China’s Communist leaders. Gui was abducted by Chinese security agents in Thailand, and taken by force to mainland China. His four colleagues also disappeared at various moments in October 2015 – one of them, Lam Wing-kee, arrested in Shenzhen, just across the border from Hong Kong, another, Lee Bo, a British national, abducted from his Hong Kong warehouse. Yet Gui’s four colleagues were all gradually released one by one in the following months. Gui, however, remains missing.

For the first three months after his disappearance, there was no trace of Gui Minhai. He, then, suddenly appeared giving a ‘confession’ on Chinese state television, claiming he had voluntarily handed himself over to the Chinese police in relation to an alleged car accident that occurred in 2003. His daughter Angela, who studies in Cambridge and has been campaigning for her father’s freedom, was able to speak to him by telephone three times in the first half of 2016, but has not heard from him for sixteen months. He has been denied access to legal counsel and Swedish consular assistance. He has not been officially charged or tried, and his whereabouts are unknown.

Two years on, it is time for the international community to ask some very serious questions of China. It is time to speak up for Gui Minhai. The Swedish government and others have been remarkably quiet, claiming to be working through diplomatic channels to assist Gui – yet after two years it is time to conclude that quiet diplomacy has not worked.

China has cleverly withheld information about why Gui is being detained, making it awkward for international human rights organisations to take up his case. Astonishingly, only PEN International, of which Gui is a member, has spoken out. That must change. This is surely a case of enforced disappearance and arbitrary detention, which requires action by the United Nations Working Group on Enforced Disappearances or the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention.

Angela Gui has spoken at the United Nations, the U.S. Congress, and the British Parliament, and written an op-ed for The Washington Post, but her appeals for help appear to have fallen on deaf ears. She herself has faced threats and surveillance. Yet as she says, this is not about one man alone. “This is about China actively extending its control beyond its borders,” she argues:

“This is about China kidnapping and illegally detaining more and more people because of their political beliefs. It’s about European citizens no longer being able to know that their human rights will be protected … In what has been called ‘the darkest moment’ for human rights in China in recent years we have to make sure that people like my father are not forgotten. Because to stay silent over what happened to him is to guarantee that it will happen again.”

When I was denied entry to Hong Kong, many people spoke up for me. The British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson and US Congressman Chris Smith released statements. Hong Kong legislator Ray Chan courageously staged a protest in the Legislative Council, holding an enlarged photograph of me with him, taken in London two weeks earlier, and he was thrown out of the chamber for doing so. I am deeply grateful for such support, which is important, not for me personally, but for Hong Kong and the principles at stake – for this is not about me, it is about Hong Kong and its future.

But if such statements can be made in defence of a British national denied entry to Hong Kong, shouldn’t there be a far louder outcry when a Swedish national is abducted and disappeared into mainland China and held almost incommunicado for two years? When Angela asked me if I would speak at a vigil outside the Chinese embassy in London today to mark the second anniversary of her father’s abduction, I immediately agreed. I know how important solidarity is. But I asked her who else would be speaking. Her reply was heartbreaking:

“To be honest, you are the only one speaking out for my father in Britain right now”.

That must change. Join us, and ask China: Where is Gui Minhai?