Beijing dismisses attacks over jailing of Taiwanese rights activist

Beijing said on Wednesday that any attempt to hype up its decision to jail a Taiwanese rights activist for subversion would be futile after Taiwan’s ruling political party labelled the result “unacceptable”.

A mainland court on Tuesday jailed Li Ming-cheh, a Taiwanese community college lecturer and human rights non-governmental worker, for five years for subverting Chinese state power.

Li was tried alongside a mainland activist, Peng Yuhua, who received a seven-year sentence for the same charge. Both were found guilty of attempting to promote political reform in China through discussions of democracy in social media chat rooms.

Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party said the result was “totally unacceptable” and called for Beijing to return Li to Taiwan. It is not a crime for Li to share his opinions about democratic freedoms with friends, they said.

The mainland’s Taiwan Affairs Office spokesman Ma Xiaoguang told reporters at a regular news briefing: “Any attempts to hype up the case for political ends or to instigate opposition between compatriots across the straits will all be futile.”

Although Taiwan and Beijing should have mutual respect for each other’s social systems and development paths, Taiwan cannot “impose” its political ideas on the mainland or use the cover of democratic freedoms to break Chinese law, Ma said.