News Snapshot:
In January last year, a Chinese construction porter in Hubei called Jiang Tianlu was taking his seven-year-old daughter to school when police appeared, seized him and locked him up in a local psychiatric hospital. For Mr Jiang, the ordeal was terrifying, but it wasn’t new. It was his fifth or sixth time – he has lost count. This had become the authorities’ way of dealing with his efforts to get justice for his father, who was beaten to death by a well-connected local official in 2004. Mr Jiang’s repeated letters and visits to petition the government in Beijing had annoyed...
