Chinese courts will reject ‘Western pressure’ in rights lawyer’s trial, says state-run tabloid
The Chinese judiciary will reject pressure from the West in the forthcoming trial of detained rights lawyer Pu Zhiqiang and resist the imposition of Western values on China, the state newspaper the Global Times said on Wednesday.
Pu, a high profile lawyer who has represented many dissidents and activists, has been charged with “inciting ethnic hatred” and “picking quarrels and provoking trouble” for posting microblog messages online that were critical of the government’s handling of an ethnic conflict in Kunming in Yunnan province last year, as well as his sarcastic comments about two officials.
READ MORE: Chinese prosecutors drop some ‘evidence’ against detained human rights lawyer Pu Zhiqiang
Pu, who faces up to eight years in jail, insists on his innocence and his supporters say the charges were trumped up to punish him for his outspokenness.
A pre-trial meeting took place on Tuesday where some of the evidence previously held against him was dismissed, according to his lawyers.
China’s judiciary will not accept the West setting the tone for Pu’s case
The Global Times’ commentary on Wednesday said the Western media was applying pressure in Pu’s case to try to impose its “universal values”. “And behind the Western point of view is its political interest,” the newspaper linked to the Communist Party mouthpiece the People’s Daily said.