After five years of prison and three more confined by guards at home, Chinese human rights lawyer Gao Zhisheng could take no more. “The outlook for human rights is grim and we see no sign of improvement,” said Maya Wang, Human Rights Watch’s Hong Kong-based researcher, who describes the current repression as the worst since 1989′s bloody crackdown on pro-democracy protests centered on Beijing’s Tiananmen Square. Trump’s failure to raise human rights during his visit to Beijing last week “lent the Chinese government legitimacy when it is one of the worst human rights offenders,” Wang said. “I’m very pessimistic about the prospects for human rights in China.”For many rights activists, the death of imprisoned Nobel Peace Prize winner Liu Xiaobo from liver cancer in July was a low point. Conditions could get worse still, activists say.

Source: Egypt Independent November 17, 2017 03:11 UTC