Case history: Guo Yushan
On 14 September 2015 human rights defenders Mr Guo Yushan was released on bail. Guo Yushan had been in detention for nearly a year after being taken from his home by police in Beijing on 9 October 2014.
Guo Yushan was the founder of the Transition Institute, an independent think tank in Beijing which focused on political and economic liberalization, and carried out research on civil society, before it was force to close by the authorities in 2015.
On 14 September 2015 human rights defenders Messrs Guo Yushan and He Zhengjun were released on bail.
Guo Yushan had been in detention for nearly a year after being taken from his home by police in Beijing on 9 October 2014. He Zhengjun had been in custody since 26 November 2014.
Guo Yushan and He Zhengjun were formally arrested on 3 January 2015 on charges of 'illegal business activity', by which time they had been held for three months in Beijing No.1 Detention Centre following their detention by police in October and November 2014 on suspicion of “picking quarrels”.
In the early hours of 9 October 2014 human rights defender Mr Guo Yushan was taken from his home by police in Beijing and was detained on suspicion of “picking quarrels”. He is being held in Beijing No.1 Detention Centre.
At approximately 2am on 9 October around twelve police officers reportedly arrived with a warrant at the home of Guo Yushan in Beijing. In addition to detaining the human rights defender, a computer, an iPhone, an iPad and a number of hard drives were confiscated. Guo Yushan's family were later informed that he was being held on suspicion of “picking quarrels”. It is currently unknown to what the charges specifically relate.
Guo Yushan is one of dozens of activists who have been detained in mainland China in recent weeks. Most of those detained had expressed support for the ongoing pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong. These include Beijing poet Mr Wang Zang, who was detained on 1 October after uploading to Twitter a photograph of himself holding an umbrella with the Taiwan flag in the background. The umbrella has become a symbol of the protest movement in Hong Kong. According to friends of Guo Yushan however, he had recently been keeping a very low profile, and is not know to have made any public statements of support for the pro-democracy protests.
