The Chinese dissident, Chen Guangcheng, who arrived in New York Saturday after diplomatic manuvering allowed him to come as a visiting scholar, expressed concerns about four-fellow dissidents on Monday.
Chen has been unable to contact his nephew, said his friend and mentor NYU Law Professor Jerome Cohen. “He’s concerned that lawyers have not been permitted to go down to the county seat where the nephew is being held by the police,” Cohen said. Lawyers from around the country have been prohibited from seeing him, “so the boy is left defenseless.”
He is also concerned about his oldest brother, and his wife, as well as the Chinese social scientist, Guo Yushan, all of whom helped with Chen’s dramatic escape from his hometown in Shandong, to the U.S. Embassy in Beijing.
Cohen, the person responsible for inviting him to NYU, speaks with Chen regularly. He said Chen believes Guo is a prime target of the Chinese police now because of his role in sheltering Chen when he arrived in Beijing.
Chen’s arrival in New York City marked the end of a week-long diplomatic tussle between the U.S. and China. Chen fled his rural hometown for the U.S. Embassy in Beijing. He first asked to study law in China, which was granted, and then he changed his mind, insisting on studying overseas.
The Global Times, a nationalistic state-run newspaper in China called Chen’s story a “colorful bubble,” which “has barely impacted Chinese society.”
“The majority of Chinese have a mature and stable judgment of this country. That is why dissidents, who often create a sensation in the Western media, fail to make a dent among the Chinese,” the paper wrote in an English Op-Ed.
Other commentators have pointed to other examples of political dissidents that fled overseas after the Tiananmen Square massacre in 1989, but found their influence wane.
Cohen, however, said concerns that Chen’s voice will be ineffective overseas are wrong.
“If he stayed in China under the agreed plan that he’d rejected we don’t know at all if he would’ve been free to call any friends in the human rights field or even his family in the village, or could’ve talked to journalists,” Cohen said. “The record of people like him in recent years is poor because they’re afraid to talk about anything because they’re kidnapped, beaten, kidnapped, arrested often.”
He expects social media will help Chen stay connected to his followers in China.
NYU doesn’t comment on individual students, but a spokesman said that Chen received anonymous donations to pay for his stay at NYU. The school said Chen is still discussing what type of educational program he’ll receive, adding there is no precedent for Chen’s situation.
Chen is a self-taught lawyer with no formal law degree and does not speak English.
