There is big news in the news business in Beijing! Two of the best reporters working today just received their due: Joseph Kahn and Jim Yardley of the Beijing bureau of The New York Times have jointly won the 2006 Pulitzer Prize in International Reporting for their excellent series on Chinese jurisprudence, "The Rule of Law."
I don't believe I could be more excited and happy if I'd won a Pulitzer myself (well, that is a bit hyperbolic, but you get the point; I am stoked about their achievement). We have been blogging the work of both Mr. Kahn and Mr. Yardley with great frequency over the past couple of years--so much so that it would be tedious to link to them all here.
The brief announcement from the Associated Press is below:
INTERNATIONAL REPORTING: Joseph Kahn and Jim Yardley of The New York Times
The Times reporters won for what the board said were "ambitious stories on ragged justice" in China, as the nation's legal system evolves. One article in their 2005 series, "Rule by Law," used the story of a Chinese-American entrepreneur, jailed and threatened with death, to show how the rise of quasi-capitalism in China has led to a judicial system that often serves powerful companies.
The series is only available in full to subscribers to the paper's TimesSelect Archive feature.
I will, however, provide links to their archived abstracts, and excerpt the first few graphs, the rest is between you and your wallet.
By JIM YARDLEY (NYT) 2303 words Published: December 31, 2005
YUJIAGOU, China - From the prison cell where he contemplated an executioner's bullet, a migrant worker named Wang Binyu gave an anguished account of his wasted life. Unexpectedly, it rippled across China like a primal scream.
For three weeks, the brutal murders Mr. Wang committed after failing to collect unpaid wages were weighed on the Internet and in Chinese newspapers against the brutal treatment he had endured as a migrant worker. Public opinion shouted for mercy; lawyers debated the fairness of his death sentence. Others saw the case as a bloody symptom of the harsh inequities of Chinese life.
But then, in late September, the furor disappeared as suddenly as it had begun. Online discussion was censored and news media coverage was almost completely banned. Mr. Wang's final appeal was rushed to court. His father, never notified, learned about the hearing only by accident. His chosen defense lawyer was forbidden from participating. ...
By JOSEPH KAHN (NYT) 2507 words Published: December 28, 2005
SHIQIAO, China - The peasants surrounded the clerk in the busy court anteroom, badgering him to let them sue the officials who had seized their land.
No, no, the clerk said, shaking his head and waving his hands, as the peasants recalled it. They were wasting his time and theirs. But as they withdrew, their legal papers remained on his desk in plain sight. Maybe, the peasants hoped, that meant the clerk had tacitly accepted their application to sue.
"In two years of trying every option under the law, this was a moment of optimism," said Li Huitang, a leader of peasant resistance in Shiqiao, a village in Hebei Province, in northern China. "We hoped he might rule on our request."
Even a written rejection would have been a bonanza, enabling them to appeal to a higher court. But it was not to be. The clerk soon called Mr. Li's home, ordering him to retrieve the documents. When Mr. Li declined, the clerk mailed them back in a plain manila envelope, unmarked, unprocessed and officially ignored. ...
By JIM YARDLEY (NYT) 3013 words Published: December 26, 2005
XIAOSHABA, China - Far from the pulsing cities that symbolize modern China, this tiny hillside village of crude peasant houses seems disconnected from this century and the last. But follow a dirt path past a snarling watchdog, sidestep the chickens and ducks, and a small clearing on the banks of the Nu River reveals a dusty slab of concrete lying in a rotting pumpkin patch.
The innocuous concrete block is also a symbol, of a struggle over law that touches every corner of the country.
The block marks the spot on the Nu River where officials here in Yunnan Province want to begin building one of the biggest dam projects in the world. The project would produce more electricity than even the mighty Three Gorges Dam but would also threaten a region considered an ecological treasure. This village would be the first place to disappear.
For decades, the ruling Communist Party has rammed through such projects by fiat. But the Nu River proposal, already delayed for more than a year, is now unexpectedly presenting the Chinese government with a quandary of its own making: will it abide by its own laws? ...
By JOSEPH KAHN (NYT) 3048 words Published: December 13, 2005
BEIJING, Dec. 12 - One November morning, the Beijing Judicial Bureau convened a hearing on its decree that one of China's best-known law firms must shut down for a year because it failed to file a change of address form when it moved offices.
The same morning, Gao Zhisheng, the firm's founder and star litigator, was 1,800 miles away in Xinjiang, in the remote west. He skipped what he called the "absurd and corrupt" hearing so he could rally members of an underground Christian church to sue China's secret police.
"I can't guarantee that you will win the lawsuit -- in fact you will almost certainly lose," Mr. Gao told one church member who had been detained in a raid. "But I warn you that if you are too timid to confront their barbaric behavior, you will be completely defeated."
The advice could well summarize Mr. Gao's own fateful clash with the authorities. Bold, brusque and often roused to fiery indignation, Mr. Gao, 41, is one of a handful of self-proclaimed legal "rights defenders." ...
By JIM YARDLEY (NYT) 2895 words Published: November 28, 2005
LUOYANG, China - Judge Li Huijuan happened to be in the courthouse file room when clerks, acting on urgent orders, began searching for a ruling on a mundane case about seed prices. "I handled that case," Judge Li told the clerks, surprised that anyone would be interested.
But within days, the Luoyang Middle Court's discipline committee contacted her. Provincial officials had angrily complained that the ruling contained a serious political error. Faced with a conflict between national and provincial law, Judge Li had declared the provincial law invalid. In doing so, she unwittingly made legal history, setting in motion a national debate about judicial independence in China's closed political system.
In many countries, including the United States, a judge tossing out a lower-level law would scarcely merit attention. But in China, the government, not a court, is the final arbiter of law. What Judge Li had considered judicial common sense, provincial legislators considered a judicial revolt. Their initial response was to try to crush it. Judge Li, who had on the bench less than three years, feared her career might be finished.
"An order by those in power has forced local leaders, none of whom dared to stand on principle, to sacrifice me," she wrote in rebuttal. "I'm just an ordinary person, a female judge who tried to protect the law. Who is going to protect my rights?" ...
By JIM YARDLEY (NYT) 3440 words Published: November 12, 2005
CHAOHU, China - At his most desperate, when he had no more borrowed money for his son's legal defense, Xie Yujun went to a hospital. He knew of China's black market in body parts. He wanted to sell his eyes. He was refused.
Mr. Xie, 60, is no stranger to desperate acts, if by necessity. His son was charged with a savage knife attack here in rural Anhui Province that left a mother and daughter badly wounded. The police suspected the son because of a property dispute between the families. But Mr. Xie believed the case was deeply flawed: the victims never identified the attacker. The only evidence was a questionable shoeprint. Police misconduct was blatant.
Mr. Xie's problem was convincing a court. His son's lawyers had no chance to question witnesses or, initially, to examine evidence. At one point, Mr. Xie himself sneaked into a prison to interview a witness. Even a tantalizing appeals court victory proved hollow. The son was tried again and sentenced to life in prison.
"There must be one person in the Communist Party who is honest and who believes in justice," Mr. Xie said. "If I can't even find one, then the party is not going to last long." ...
By JOSEPH KAHN (NYT) 3636 words Published: November 1, 2005
BEIJING, Oct. 31 - David Ji, a Chinese-American electronics entrepreneur, spent two months in custody enduring all-night interrogation sessions, but his stubbornness and occasional flashes of sarcasm infuriated his Chinese captors.
So in late December last year, according to a person who compiled a record of the encounter, guards emptied his pockets, removed his shoes and socks, and ripped the buttons off his oxford shirt. He was ushered disheveled and barefoot into the office of Zhao Yong, the chief executive of Sichuan Changhong Electric, Mr. Ji's onetime business partner and, more recently, his warden.
"Your only way out is to do what Changhong tells you to do," Mr. Zhao told him. "If I decide today I want you to die, you will be dead tomorrow."
Mr. Ji soon agreed to cooperate with Changhong. But a year after the Chinese police apprehended him in his hotel room during a business trip, he remains in China as a pawn -- Mr. Ji's colleagues say a hostage -- in a commercial dispute that pits Changhong, China's largest television manufacturer, against Apex Digital, Mr. Ji's electronics trading company based in Los Angeles. ...
By JOSEPH KAHN (NYT) 3386 words Published: September 21, 2005
ANYANG, China - For three days and three nights, the police wrenched Qin Yanhong's arms high above his back, jammed his knees into a sharp metal frame, and kicked his gut whenever he fell asleep. The pain was so intense that he watched sweat pour off his face and form puddles on the floor.
On the fourth day, he broke down. "What color were her pants?" they demanded. "Black," he gasped, and felt a whack on the back of his head. "Red," he cried, and got another punch. "Blue," he ventured. The beating stopped.
This is how Mr. Qin, a 35-year-old steel mill worker in Henan Province in central China, recalled groping in the darkness of a interrogation room to deduce the "correct" details of a rape and murder, end his torture and give the police the confession they required to close a nettlesome case.
On the strength of his coerced confession alone, prosecutors indicted Mr. Qin. A panel of judges then convicted him and sentenced him to death. He is alive today only because of a rare twist of fate that proved his innocence and forced the authorities to let him go, though not before a final push to have him executed anyway.
Justice in China is swift but not sure. Criminal investigations nearly always end in guilty pleas. Prosecutors almost never lose cases brought to trial. But recent disclosures of wrongful convictions like Mr. Qin's have exposed deep flaws in a judicial system that often answers more to political leaders than the law. ...
Here's a tip of the keyboard to you guys, a toast with a scotch or two will come at another time.
