China - politics

Chinese dissident says that RFI lifted his spirits during time in jail

Article published on the 2009-05-28 Latest update 2009-06-04 06:29 TU

Jiang Weiping
(Photo: Committee to Protect Journalists)

On a visit to Paris on Thursday, Jiang Weiping came to Radio France Internationale and explained how the memory of Tiananmen in 1989 remains "sharp in the minds of journalists and scholars in China".

"It's a deep wound for the Chinese nation therefore the memory cannot fade. One day, the verdict about what happened will change," said Jiang.

Jiang came to Paris to see the studios that had broadcast his story, during RFI's Chinese news broadcast at the end of 2006.

He told RFI that it had lifted his spirits, "to realise that there were people in the world who didn't know me, but who wanted to help me and who were concerned about what happened to me."

Jiang had been convicted on subversion charges in 2001 after exposing corruption at the local and provincial levels in China’s industrial northeast.

RFI was "very important for me when I was in prison. It's very important for others still in prison. It's indispensible."

Jiang told RFI that he was able to listen to a transistor with earphones during his work hours in prison, when he was alone.

China eventually reduced his eight-year sentence under pressure from international organisations. He was released in 2006, but had to wait for another two years to obtain travel documents to join his family, who he now lives with in Canada.