The Mystery of the Blind Chinese Lawyer

While the media frequently loves a mystery it appears to have been blind to this one.

If the facts here do not constitute a mystery worthy of Sherlock Holmes, it is difficult to imagine a better one.

Let us examine the facts: A blind self-taught lawyer named Chen Guangcheng is placed under house arrest by the Chinese authorities. According to reports the house arrest is severe. According to Human Rights Watch:

Since July 2011, increasing numbers of Chinese citizens have attempted to break the unlawful blockade around Chen’s home in order to visit him and express support. These activists encounter obstruction by police and plainclothes thugs who appear to operate at official behest and who unlawfully detain them and prevent them from reaching Chen’s hometown in Dongshigu, Linyi County of Shandong Province. Some activists have been beaten and robbed in their attempts to reach Chen’s village. Chen and Yuan were reportedly brutally beaten for four hours by the local mayor and other officials, in the presence of their daughter.  

Chen said that guards had, during the period of confinement, broken one of his wife’s bones and physically assaulted his elderly mother on her most recent birthday.

The reader should note that the guards prevented activist supporting Chen from reaching him. According to Amnesty International:

Visitors attempting to see Chen while under house arrest told media they were beaten, robbed of their possessions, and driven away from the village with bags over their heads in one famous attempt to visit the blind activist, Batman actor Christian Bale and a CNN television crew accompanying him were roughed up by a local guard.

According to the Sun Sentinel of South Florida:

The yard appeared enclosed with a high wall, a feature of homes typical of the rural areas of northern China. Outside the Chen home is a dusty, quiet village of one-story brick and concrete houses surrounded by farmland.

Other reports mentioned barbed wire.

Yet wonder of wonders, suddenly activists who had not been able to get to Chen before were able to scale the wall, get through the barbed wire, elude the guards and get to him, at the very moment that a high level US State Department delegation was on the way to Beijing.

Not only get to him, but lead this blind man, past the guards without being seen, get him over a wall, and make it to Beijing and the American Embassy. All without his family accompanying him, and without any concern that retribution would be visited upon them.

He then tells the embassy personnel that he wants them to negotiate for his release from house arrest, to be allowed to have medical treatment, to be reunited with his family in Beijing and then to be allowed to study at a Chinese university. American diplomats get the Chinese to agree to all the terms and Chen leaves the Embassy and goes to a hospital where he is reunited with his family.

END OF STORY, or at least one would have thought so. An American diplomatic triumph!!!

Suddenly Chen claims to have discovered that his family and those who helped him were beaten after his escape. Is that not what he should have, and probably did anticipate? The Chinese now, ostensively, bar American diplomats from seeing him in the hospital, but allow him to have a cell phone. ARE THE CHINESE STUPID OR WHAT ARE THEY UP TO?

Chen then announces that upon his discovery that his family has been abused (surprise, surprise), asks to be allowed to go to the US with his family, starts phoning all over the world with his cell phone and the Chinese do not interfere. He calls the Associated Press, he calls American officials at the Embassy and he telephones Chris Smith (R-N.J), the chairman of the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, to examine Chen Guangcheng’s quandary. See here. Lo and behold Chris Smith knows that Chen is going to call and has a Chinese interpreter and cameras standing by.

STRANGE, STRANGE, but the American media saw nothing strange. Just another example of the strange behavior of the American media.

Of course there is an immediate attempt to make the incident into an American political football, as Mitt Romney, the presumptive Republican nominee, says it would be a “dark day for freedom’’ if press reports were borne out that U.S. officials had persuaded Mr. Chen to leave his sanctuary in the U.S. Embassy in Beijing, when all indications were that they had simply been following his wishes. Things, however, don't turn out so well for Romney. According to the Wall Street Journal: “Robert Jeffress, senior pastor of First Baptist Church in Dallas, a mega-church, said in an interview Friday:"

The way the administration has handled this thus far is encouraging, especially given the positive response of the Chinese people and the Chinese government to date. But ultimately, the proof of their competency will be in the final result. He said it wasn’t the time to criticize administration officials working toward a solution. 

Right now, as Christians, we ought to be praying for Secretary (Hillary) Clinton and the Obama administration instead of taking cheap shots for partisan gain,’’ the pastor said. 

Asked about Mr. Romney’s statements, he added: “I don’t think now is the time to engage in political partisanship.

But Rep. Frank Wolf (R-Va.), said he will formally request a congressional review of all cable traffic, classified or otherwise, that surrounded the negotiations for Chen to leave the embassy. 

Now that it appears to have been agreed that Chen and his family are to come to the US with the consent of all concerned, unless Chen changes his mind again. It is to be hoped that the partisanship will end – BUT THE MYSTERY REMAINS.

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