Illegal ‘discipline centers’ ordered to close
Print Edition
A PROVINCE in central China which The Beijing News said had built several “discipline education centers” for petitioners, and which were regarded as a variant of the abolished re-education through labor camps, has been ordered to close them.
Last night, Henan Province’s politics and law committee and the provincial bureau for letters and visits said such centers were illegal, according to Xinhau news agency.
Earlier, a resident of Nanyang in Henan Province posted a picture of a building in the city’s Wolong District online, with a caption saying that his or her 70-year-old mother was held there after she had left the city to appeal for help from higher authorities. No details of her petition were given.
There was an immediate outcry online with many people saying the center was just a new type of labor camp, where minor offenders used to be held without trial.
Laojiao, or “re-education through labor,” began in the 1950s, but was abolished following a resolution on December 28 last year by the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress.
Under laojiao, people could be detained for up to four years without trial.
The practice led to several highly controversial incidents.
One well-known case was that of Tang Hui, a 40-year-old mother who was put in the program in Hunan Province after she petitioned for harsher punishments for the men found guilty of raping her daughter and forcing her into prostitution. In July, a court ruled in her favor when she sued the local authority for infringing on her personal freedom and causing her mental suffering.
Legal experts had long criticized the program and called for its abolition.
The newspaper found that similar institutions were mentioned on the websites of many other local governments in Henan, including Zhumadian, Dengzhou and Xinxiang.
Most were described as places of providing “24 hours of nonstop admonishing, warning, persuading and education” for petitioners “improperly” appealing to higher authorities.
In December, Zhumadian’s government said on its website that 300,000 yuan (US$49,470) had been spent to set up a discipline education center.
A website for Henan’s political-legal news (www.hapa.gov.cn) also had an article saying that Nanyang’s Xinye County had built a discipline education center at a cost of more than 70,000 yuan in 2010.
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