China: Dissident Poet Jailed for 12 Years

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/20/world/asia/chines-poet-li-bifeng-jailed-for-12-years.html

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A dissident Chinese poet was sentenced Monday by a court in southwestern China to 12 years in prison for contract fraud, his lawyer said. The poet, Li Bifeng, who was formerly imprisoned for five years for his involvement in the Tiananmen Square democracy movement, was sentenced in Sichuan Province, said his lawyer, Zhao Jianwei. Mr. Li’s wife, Zhan Xia, said the case was related to a sales agreement that her husband had signed with a company to help sell some apartments but that the charges against him were “groundless.” A friend of Mr. Li’s, the exiled dissident Liao Yiwu, said Mr. Li, 48, was singled out because he was suspected of financing Mr. Liao’s escape from China last year. Mr. Liao said those suspicions were false.