HRIC Weekly Brief
September 9, 2025
Top News 头条
In the mid-1990s, a growing understanding of human rights issues in China created opportunities for lawyers and citizens to stand side by side to defend their rights, thus empowering Chinese human rights lawyers to evolve into a formidable force in the early 2000s. Lawyers challenged the existing legal system with individual cases, defending the rule of law and even pushing back against taboos on political and religious cases. A new piece from preeminent Chinese journalist Jiang Xue chronicles the last twenty years of Chinese human rights lawyers and their work, from an emerging legal profession to a repressed class.
In more legal news, the National People’s Congress Standing Committee (NPCSC)’s seventeenth session is ongoing till Friday, September 12. In addition to the 16 draft laws, the NPCSC has announced it will also review the draft Law on Promoting Ethnic Unity and Progress, which has been prioritized to “improve the institutions and mechanisms for forging a strong sense of community for the Chinese nation and further strengthen national cohesion.” The law is expected to create further pressure for groups such as Tibetans and Uyghurs to assimilate and comply with CCP political guidance. The NPCSC is also reviewing a draft amendment to the 2017 Cybersecurity Law, proposed by the Cyberspace Administration of China. According to independent non-governmental organization ARTICLE 19, the draft amendment doubles down on China’s repressive norms and poses a global threat by normalizing China’s authoritarian model of digital governance.
Law & Policy 法律与政策
June–August 2025: "Recording and Review" Guiding Cases on Fairer Regulatory Practices: Highlights of this recap of the last three months of activities from the National People’s Congress (NPC) and its Standing Committee (NPCSC) include the revised law of public security offenses; amended rules for grassroots legislative outreach offices; and major upgrades to official Chinese law database.
Cyber Security & Digital Rights 网络安全与数字权利
US tech companies enabled the surveillance and detention of hundreds of thousands in China: A new AP investigation has found that much of the technology used to create and enforce the Chinese surveillance apparatus actually comes from U.S.-based tech companies. Reportedly, U.S. companies "sold billions of dollars of technology" to the Chinese authorities with devastating effects on human rights, despite warnings that their tech was "being used to quash dissent, persecute religious sects and target minorities."
Minitrue: Chengdu Cybersecurity Corps on “Ideological Risks During Third Quarter 2025”: Leaked documents have revealed a long list of instructions from the Chengdu Cybersecurity Corps on potential “ideological risks” during the third quarter of 2025, including copious warnings against infiltration by hostile “foreign forces,” overseas NGOs, and so on.
Is Chinese AI Now Safer Than US AI?: China’s State Council outlined a ten-year plan for gradually expanding “AI+” across six key areas—Science and Technology, Industry, Consumption, Individual Well-Being, Governance, and Global Cooperation—with the goal of over 70 percent of these six sectors using AI-driven smart devices, agents and apps within the next two years.
Chinese cyber spies impersonated key U.S. lawmaker: Fraudulent emails that appeared to be from Rep. John Moolenaar, chair of the House China Select Committee, were sent to a wide range of individuals, including those at U.S. government agencies, business groups, D.C. law firms and think tanks and at least one foreign government.
DeepSeek and the digital battleground: China’s AI influence abroad: Chinese AI has sparked interest across developing countries and paved the way for China to position itself as a key tech partner for the Global South, pushing the narrative of bridging the AI gap for less developed regions, especially for surveillance and propaganda purposes.
‘Unrestrained’ Chinese Cyberattackers May Have Stolen Data From Almost Every American: The investigation into the yearslong “Salt Typhoon” cyberespionage campaign has concluded that millions of ordinary peoples’ data was likely impacted, in a wide-ranging initiative that prioritized breadth and reach over the global communications network.
Diaspora Community & Transnational Repression 海外社群和跨国镇压
Tibetans in Europe and USA call on China to release Tibetan environmentalist A-Nya Sengdra: Tibetans in diaspora have rallied alongside international organizations to call for the release of environmental activist A-Nya Sengdra, who was arrested on September 4, 2018 and sentenced to seven years in prison for leading a peaceful campaign against illegal mining projects, poaching and corruption. Initially scheduled to be released on September 4, 2025, the Chinese authorities arbitrarily extended his sentence until February 2026, without giving any reason for the change.
Human Rights Defenders & Civil Society 人权捍卫者与公民社会
China clamps down on feminists, they fight back: Feminism in China has grown more decentralized and less dependent on formal organizations, but continues to challenge both patriarchal norms and political restrictions. While individual activists carry high risks, informal support networks remain.
A Hidden Camera Protest Turned the Tables on China’s Surveillance State: The “Chongqing Protestor,” Qi Hong, set up security cameras to record the police as they discovered his projector and letter, left in a hotel room, and questioned his mother outside her village home.
Tulku Palden Wangyal dies in a Chinese prison after years of torture: Prominent Tibetan religious leader Tulku Palden Wangyal, also known as Chogyal Tulku, died in a Chinese prison on July 19 following years of imprisonment and reported torture. Tulku Palden Wangyal was known for his efforts to preserve Tibetan culture and identity, but Chinese authorities viewed his teachings as a challenge to state control.
New Report: Violence, Squalor, and Indoctrination Inside Hong Kong’s Prisons: A new report by the Committee for Freedom in Hong Kong Foundation titled “We Were Made to Suffer: Systemic Abuse and Political Control Inside Hong Kong’s Prisons,” based on extensive interviews with former inmates, many speaking out for the first time, documents systemic violence, political control, and unlivable conditions behind Hong Kong’s prison walls.
Hong Kong court denies Portuguese citizen’s appeal for shorter nat. security sentence at top court: Joseph John, a Portuguese national also known as Wong Kin-chun, was the leader of the now-disbanded UK-based Hong Kong Independence Party. John had been sentenced to five years in prison in April 2024 after pleading guilty to conspiring to incite secession through social media posts.
League of Social Democrats activist found not guilty of displaying unauthorised street booth poster in 2022: Yu Wai-pan, former vice chairperson of the League of Social Democrats, had displayed a poster featuring pictures of the now-defunct opposition party’s detained members Leung Kwok-hung, also known as “Long Hair,” Jimmy Sham, and Figo Chan, alongside a Chinese phrase meaning “helping the needy, proceed without hesitation.” In the ruling, the judge stated that the poster was small and did not obstruct the flow of pedestrian traffic.
Hong Kong man pleads guilty to spray-painting ‘6436’ on noticeboard on 36th Tiananmen anniversary: Tsang Kin-fung scrawled ‘6436’ and candle patterns on a noticeboard on the 36th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square crackdown on June 4, 2025.
7 people cleared of terrorism charges linked to multiple bomb plots in 2020: A panel of nine jurors at the High Court unanimously acquitted Lukas Ho, Lee Ka-pan, Ng Tsz-lok, Yeung Yi-sze, Cheung Ka-chun, Cheung Cheuk-ki, and Rebecca Ho of conspiring to commit bombing of prescribed objects in three bomb plots between November 2019 and March 2020, allegedly related to the 2019 protest movement.
LGBTQ groups urge Hong Kong to ‘fully recognise’ same-sex partnerships ahead of bill’s second reading: The joint letter called on the Hong Kong government to “fully comply” with a landmark ruling by the city’s Court of Final Appeal in 2023, which mandated that an “alternative framework” that recognizes same-sex partnerships should be set up within two years.
China’s Reach & Internal Control 中国: 内控与外扩
What 3 million suggestions reveal about China’s evolving governance under Xi Jinping: A national campaign to gather public input and feedback through digital platforms for the 15th Five-Year Plan seems to promote inclusivity but has raised questions about transparency and influence.
The Technopolitics of China’s Yarlung Tsangpo Dam Project and the Paradox of Hydropower: The Chinese authorities appear to view hydropower as foundational to China’s energy and water security, economic development, and energy transition, despite its negative impact on each of those efforts.
China opens boarding school in eastern Tibet amid assimilation concerns: International concern over these practices has been growing. The Tibet Action Institute, which has extensively documented China’s vast network of colonial boarding schools, explains that such institutions are designed not to nurture but to assimilate.
Nat. security checks now required for school activities by external organisers to prevent ‘political propaganda’: The August 2025 edition of the Hong Kong School Administration Guide now require schools to review the details of activities held by external organizations or individuals, including the nature, background, and mode of the activities, as well as the identities and background of the organizers or guests.
International Responses 国际反应
U.S. House passes Uyghur Policy Act supporting victims of persecution by China: The Uyghur Policy Act, sponsored by a bipartisan group in the U.S. Congress, is a bill that advances a strategy for the United States to support Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities enduring persecution at the hands of China’s government. The bill will now go before the U.S. Senate.