'Police officers inflict sexual torture on inmates in Guangzhou', jailed activist claims
Legal rights campaigner Guo Feixiong says fellow detainees at Guangzhou centre forced to strip and endure physical abuse by officers
A veteran legal activist claims that some inmates at the Guangzhou detention centre where he is held have been subject to sexual abuse and torture, his lawyer said on Friday.
Guo Feixiong, who has been detained in police custody for 20 months, released details of the alleged abuse through his lawyer, Li Jinxing, after the two met at the Tianhe District Detention Centre in Guangzhou on Thursday.
Guo went on trial in late November on the charge of "gathering a crowd to disturb public order", more than a year after he was taken into custody in August 2013.
Police accused him of being a mastermind behind rallies in support of the newspaper, also known as the , in Guangzhou in January 2013, after reporters and editors complained of censorship.
According to a statement dictated to Li, Guo said that on March 25 three police officers went into his cell and demanded inmates take their underpants off. When he refused to comply, he was taken out of the cell.
He then overheard an inmate screaming in pain. When Guo returned to his cell later, an inmate surnamed Wu said the three police officers "roughly handled" his genitals and hit his buttocks. No further details were given.
"He [Wu] felt he had been subject to serious sexual abuse," said Guo's statement, now posted online.
The statement said another inmate surnamed Gao told Guo the police officer ordered him to strip naked and jump up and down, while one policeman threatened to kill him.
A staff member at the Tianhe detention centre refused to comment yesterday. Phone calls to the Tianhe Public Security Bureau went unanswered.
Li said abuses in custody and prisons were widespread and sometimes even resulted in death, but he had rarely heard of sexual torture.
Li said Guo was risking his personal safety in the hope that the authorities would investigate the matter.
"He was very certain that after exposing this, he would be tortured himself," Li said.
Li said he planned to visit Guo again next week and if the authorities refused, it could mean Guo had already been tortured.
Li said Guo was already subject to ill treatment, having been denied his rights to receive letters and visits from his family as well as outdoor exercise since he was detained in August 2013.
Another lawyer, Zhang Lei, who saw Guo two weeks ago, said he was held in a cramped 30 square metre cell with around 30 inmates. He said Guo was suffering from malnutrition.
Patrick Poon, China researcher at Amnesty International, said the treatment of inmates described by Guo amounted to a breach of international and Chinese law, which prohibited torture in custody. He called on the authorities to investigate.
"Guo is very vulnerable to revenge against him," Poon said.
By law, mainland courts should deliver a verdict within three months of a trial, but Guo's lawyers said they did not know why a judgment had still not been handed down, four months after their client faced court.
Correction: A previous headline mistakenly stated that Guo was a once-jailed activist.
