Global Courant 2023-04-26 14:16:43
TAIPEI, Taiwan — A Taiwan-based publisher who disappeared while in China has been detained for suspected violations of security laws, Chinese authorities confirmed Wednesday, fueling concerns in Taiwan that Beijing is sending a warning to the island’s vibrant publishing sector .
The publisher, Li Yanhe, commonly known by his pseudonym Fu Cha, is a Chinese citizen who has been living in Taiwan since 2009. His company, Gusa Publishing, is known in Taiwan for its books that take a critical look at China’s Communist Party rule. Mr Li had returned to China to visit family early last month, but lost contact shortly afterwards, according to his colleagues and friends.
The detention of Mr. Li is “a hard blow and will have a chilling effect,” Bei Ling, a writer from China who lives in Taiwan, said Wednesday. “Publishing, publishing and freedom of the press are the basic indicators of an open society around the world. I do not think he should be condemned in this way just because he has published books that are unacceptable to China.”
The detention of Mr. Li could become another test case in the already strained ties between Taiwan and China. Beijing claims that Taiwan, a self-governing democracy, is part of Chinese territory that must accept unification. But many in Taiwan reject Beijing’s claim and have been repelled by China’s leader Xi Jinping’s authoritarian rule, including his crackdown in Hong Kong, which has chilled publications and stifled many freedoms, such as the right to protest. .
Mr. Li was under investigation on suspicion of “participating in activities that endanger national security,” said Zhu Fenglian, a spokeswoman for the Chinese government’s Taiwan Affairs Office. told reporters in Beijing. She did not provide details about the allegations against Mr. Li, but said China would protect his legitimate rights.
In China, national security crimes can mean anything from espionage to criticizing the Communist Party. People accused of such crimes can be held for months without contact with family members or lawyers.
For the supporters of Mr. The case reminds Li of the disappearance of five booksellers in Hong Kong in 2015. Chinese investigators had secretly detained the men for their involvement with a book publisher that published scathing, lurid descriptions of Mr. Xi and other Communist Party leaders. . One of the booksellers, Gui Minhai, is serving a 10-year prison sentence on charges of providing foreign intelligence. The others were eventually released after making confessions broadcast by Chinese state media.
The investigation into Mr Li was the second politically charged Taiwan-related case confirmed by China this week. Prosecutors said on Tuesday that a Taiwanese man, Yang Chih-yuan, had been formally arrested and charged with “separatist activities”. Mr. Yang is the vice chairman of the Taiwan National Party, a small party promoting independence for Taiwan. Ms. Zhu, the spokeswoman for China’s Taiwan Affairs Office, said his case was “another wake-up call for Taiwan’s separatist forces”.
The publisher, Mr. Li, was born in 1971 in northeast China. He settled down as a publisher in Shanghai, where he worked for the Shanghai Literature & Art Publishing House, before moving to Taiwan.
He was proud to be a descendant of the Manchu, the ethnic group that ruled China as the Qing Dynasty from 1644 to 1912. The Chinese name of his publishing company in Taiwan that Mr. Li founded in 2009 means reference to the administrative divisions of the Manchu rule.
Gusa Publishing produces a wide variety of books, including many translations. The offering is dominated by mainstream non-fiction such as “The China Record: An Assessment of the People’s Republic of China” by Fei-Ling Wang, a professor at the Georgia Institute of Technology, and a translation of “The Long Game: China’s grand strategy to supplant the American orderby Rush Doshi.
Taiwanese authorities may have a particularly difficult time accessing Mr. Li while in custody on the mainland, given the tensions between the two sides and the fact that he remains a citizen of the People’s Republic of China.
“Fu Cha was born in mainland China, and it is quite possible that he would not be allowed to leave mainland China because of this,” says Lam Wing-kee, one of the Hong Kong booksellers detained in China in 2015 . Lam has been living in Taiwan since 2019. He said, “Publishers in Taiwan have to be careful because you can never change China’s mind.”
Taiwan’s Mainland Affairs Council did not immediately respond to an email request for comment. Mr. Li’s wife, who is Taiwanese, has refused to speak publicly about his case.
“We believe that Fu Cha has not committed any crime in exercising his freedom of expression and publication,” said a statement released over the weekend by a group of authors, translators and business partners of Gusa Publishing. “We urge the Chinese authorities to immediately release Fu Cha so that he can soon be reunited with his family and return to the publishing work he loves.”
Chris Buckley contributed reporting.
