HRIC Weekly Brief
November 5, 2025
Top News 头条
This Halloween, on October 31, police deployed in cities across China to prevent people from wearing Halloween costumes, while universities warned students not to celebrate or post Halloween content. The crackdown on Halloween reflects the government’s fear of civil society voices and public assembly and its desire for total control. Police appeared in shopping districts and subway entrances across multiple cities nationwide—not to maintain order, but to prevent “costumed outings.” In stark contrast to the atmosphere of fear at home, overseas Chinese used Halloween to express political satire.
Also on October 31, a mass protest broke out in Jiashao Town, Qiongzhong County, Hainan. The Jiashao branch of the China Hainan Rubber Industry Group had sent people to sneak into villagers’ farmlands and secretly chop down the betel nut trees that the villagers rely on for their livelihood. Some villagers even reported that they also severed the heads of the cows the villagers were raising, sparking extreme public outrage. This latest escalation grew out of longstanding conflicts following the restructuring of Hainan’s farm system. Locals recalled that in the past, farmers contributed land as shares to collective farms and received wages in lieu of capital investment, earning both salaries and dividends. But after the farms were restructured into state-owned enterprises, the land originally belonging to villagers was treated as corporate assets. The Qiongzhong protest is not just a local land dispute; it is a microcosm of issues in China’s rural reforms, where responsibilities between farmers and state-owned enterprises remain blurred, benefit relations are murky, and land has become the front line of conflict between state-run enterprise and ordinary farmers’ livelihoods. When conflicts erupt, the government’s choice to disregard public interests through excessive police stabilization efforts and information blockades only intensifies the public’s resentment.
Law & Policy 法律与政策
Notice on Regulating Popular Medical Science Outreach through “Personal Media”: The notice consolidates web platforms’ responsibility for the management of information content and regulates the publication and dissemination of popular medical science information on social media.
NPC Calendar: November 2025: The Public Health Emergency Response Law and the Law on Publicity and Education on the Rule of Law, both adopted on September 12, 2025, will take effect on November 1.
Chinese Legislature Seeks Public Comment on 4 Bills: Procuratorate-Initiated Public Interest Litigation, Arable Land Protection & Environmental Code: Of note is the Procuratorial Public Interest Litigation Law, which defines 14 existing categories of public interest litigation and adds two new ones on cultural heritage and national defense, reflecting the system’s expanding reach in these areas.
Company Law Draft Judicial Interpretation Part I: General Provisions: The new draft introduces updated judicial standards for legal representatives, related-party transactions, guarantees, veil-piercing, and shareholder litigation, and aligns prior interpretations with the amended Company Law and the Civil Code.
Likely no consequences for Hong Kong authorities for not enacting same-sex partners framework, gov’t adviser says: In a 2023 landmark verdict, the Court of Final Appeal gave the government two years to establish a framework giving legal recognition to same-sex partners with overseas marriage registrations. The October 27, 2025, deadline passed without word from the authorities.
Cyber Security & Digital Rights 网络安全与数字权利
Netizen Voices: Tencent’s Positive Energy Algorithm Task Force and the Perils of “Information Cocoons”: ‘Positive energy’ in terms of information controls and official messaging refers to the need for uplifting messages as opposed to critical or negative, particularly the need for content that puts the Party and government in a positive light.
DeepSeek in Malaysia; Government “AI Industry Funds”; Is China Winning in AI Efficiency?: NurAI is the world’s “First Shariah-Aligned LLM,” built off of DeepSeek and tailored for Malaysia and Indonesia’s Islamic communities. When tested, the model was able to provide answers about “sensitive” topics such as Tiananmen Square and Xinjiang in Malay and Indonesian (though not in Chinese), but template answers from the original DeepSeek model still frequently popped up. “Writing ‘Xinjiang’ yields a response in Chinese about how well the government is treating the province’s population, while ‘Taiwan’ yields another Chinese response about the island’s place as a ‘sacred’ piece of Chinese territory since ancient times.”
CDT Quote of the Day: Local Media Excuses Failure to Report on Elementary School Vehicular Attack—“Our Hands Are Tied, Too”: Police and media silence after a car plowed into a large crowd of students and parents near an elementary school in the city of Shiyan, Hubei province, has angered many Chinese netizens. An official police statement did not appear until three days after the incident, with no explanation for the delay.
Translation: Q&A – What Should I Do if I’ve Accidentally Used a Sensitive Word in My WeChat Post?: Speaking from experience, WeChat users shared advice on getting potentially sensitive topics past WeChat’s pre-publication filters, including several common techniques like using homophones, pinyin, foreign languages, and misdirection.
‘DeepSeek is humane. Doctors are more like machines’: my mother’s worrying reliance on AI for health advice: This article explores the use of AI in healthcare in China, where AI doctors are banned from generating prescriptions, but there is little regulatory oversight on what they say, and companies are left to make their own ethical decisions.
From beaches to ski slopes, photos show how cameras keep watch all over China: The latest high-tech surveillance project is the “Xueliang Project,” or Sharp Eyes, a reference to a quote from Communist China’s founder, Mao Zedong, who once said “the people have sharp eyes” when urging them to report on their neighbors.
Chinese Government Launches Campaign to Regulate Livestream Tipping: The Cyberspace Administration of China is launching a two-month campaign targeting what it calls “irregular tipping” in both group and private livestreams, signaling intensified government scrutiny of the fast-growing sector.
Diaspora Community & Transnational Repression 海外社群和跨国镇压
UK university halted human rights research after pressure from China: In a stunning example of transnational repression, the UK’s Sheffield Hallam University caved to pressure from China and ordered professor Laura Murphy to stop critical research on forced labor in China that specifically investigated supply chains and abuses against Uyghur populations. The ban lasted from February to October of this year, when Murphy threatened legal action.
China opens probe into Taiwanese lawmaker for ‘separatist activities’: Puma Shen is an outspoken member of Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), which advocates for Taiwan’s sovereignty. This is not Shen’s first brush with the Chinese authorities, and he says it is “different” this time.
Swiss Light Show Removes Tibet Segment After “Too Political” Label: The Tibet projection was removed after the Parliamentary Services, which manages the Federal Palace, deemed it politically sensitive and mandated that only projections without “political intentions” are allowed.
China Targets Taiwanese Companies With Claim They Assist Psychological Warfare Efforts: The five companies are tech companies that have taken tenders for app and digital tool development from the Chinese government. In recent times, the Chinese government has frequently used accusations of psychological warfare to target Taiwanese entities.
Radio Free Asia suspends news operations amid cuts and US government shutdown: The independent news outlet, founded nearly three decades ago to report on China and other Asian countries without independent media, has been forced to suspend all remaining news content production for the first time in its 29 years of existence.
Related: Tibetan Sikyong bemoans information void in Tibet as VOA, RFA defunding bites. Sikyong Penpa Tsering said: “People are feeling the void already. From within Tibet, we receive messages, like – they can’t say directly, so they are saying, ‘we are missing our morning tea’.”
Hong Kong diaspora groups call on UK government to take firm stance on China: The letter raises concerns that the UK government’s current strategy on the PRC has unduly prioritized a deepened economic relationship with the PRC over protecting national security, and urges the government to take a stronger stance against security threats posed by the PRC.
Human Rights Defenders & Civil Society 人权捍卫者与公民社会
NGOs demand immediate and unconditional release of Chow Hang-tung and Lee Cheuk-yan: HRIC and other organizations call on the governments of the G7 and EU/EEA members to exert diplomatic pressure, both bilaterally and multilaterally, on the Hong Kong government to drop all charges and release Chow Hang-tung and Lee Cheuk-yan immediately and unconditionally.
Hong Kong court rejects Tiananmen activist Chow Hang-tung’s bid to have subversion charge quashed: Rejecting Chow’s bid, the judge said that whether the prosecution’s interpretation of the law would stand and whether the defendants did commit any illegal acts to bring the Chinese Communist Party’s rule to an end would be matters to be handled during the formal trial.
江苏无锡维权人士沈爱斌在派出所遭警察殴打后又遭刑事拘留 羁押在无锡市看守所 [Shen Aibin, a human rights activist from Wuxi, Jiangsu Province, was beaten by police at a police station and subsequently criminally detained in the Wuxi Detention Center.]: On the afternoon of October 27, 2025 , Shen was violently beaten by police officers at the Dongting Police Station of the Xishan Branch of the Wuxi Public Security Bureau. Shen is a retired soldier, rights activist, and citizen journalist who has been detained and sentenced by the authorities multiple times for his rights activism.
Tibetan political prisoner Dorje Tashi celebrated his 17th birthday in prison, and human rights lawyers sent a letter expressing their support.: Dorje Tashi, a Tibetan business elite, was arrested and imprisoned in 2008 after authorities found receipts for his offerings to the Dalai Lama. In 2010, he was sentenced to life imprisonment for “loan fraud” and has been serving his sentence for nearly 17 years.
Hong Kong woman, 19, pleads guilty to sedition over videos promoting ‘subversive’ shadow legislature: Lan, who is accused of filming promotional videos for the “Hong Kong Parliament,” is expected to be sentenced on November 13.
16-year-old pleads guilty to conspiring to commit secession over involvement with Hong Kong independence group: The teen had contacted the founder of the Hong Kong Democratic Independence Union last November via WhatsApp and asked to join the group. He was charged alongside two other men, also involved with the Hong Kong Democratic Independence Union.
Macau independent news outlet announces closure following gov’t deregistration: All About Macau was founded in 2010 as an online media platform, known for its coverage of Macau’s 2014 protests, when some 20,000 people rallied to oppose granting perks to retired government officials.
Hong Kong security chief lambasts wanted activist for urging boycott of ‘patriots only’ legislative race: Hong Kong’s security chief Chief Tang warned that Ted Hui encouraging blank ballots may violate the city’s national security law.
2 Hong Kong men held in custody after being charged with conspiring to incite others to riot in 2019 protests: Ng Tsz-lok and Chan Wai-leong were among five people arrested on Tuesday on suspicion of manufacturing and providing weapons to frontline protesters during the protests and unrest six years ago.
Related: 5 arrested for manufacturing weapons during 2019 protests in Hong Kong. The five are suspected of committing the offences of aiding and abetting a riot, inciting a riot, and conspiring to incite a riot under the Public Order Ordinance.
Hong Kong activist Andrew Chiu first to be granted early release from prison in landmark subversion case: Chiu, who testified for the prosecution in exchange for a jail term reduction in the city’s landmark subversion trial, has become the first person charged in the case to be granted early release from prison.
China’s Reach & Internal Control 中国: 内控与外扩
The CCP uses “academic seminars” to whitewash Tibet’s colonial-style boarding school assimilation education system.: On October 27, the Chinese Communist Party held the “International Academic Symposium on Boarding Education and Plateau Development” seminar at the University of Electronic Science and Technology of China in Chengdu, Sichuan Province, in an attempt to justify the forced Sinicization education in Tibetan colonial boarding schools.
Hong Kong legislature now an ‘echo chamber,’ 4 years after shake-up: Experts are saying that Hong Kong no longer tolerates even mild dissent in the legislative chamber, and that attempts to change the system from within have failed.
International Responses 国际反应
Japan PM says raised ‘serious concerns’ with Chinese president on Hong Kong, South China Sea, Xinjiang: Sanae Takaichi is known for taking a tough stance on China. She told reporters that she raised a number of thorny issues with Xi Jinping, saying that it was “important for us to engage in direct, candid dialogue”.