The PEN is not mightier than the ......Travel Visa

It is just over a month into the new year, and already China's record on tolerating dissent isn't look too good.

According to International PEN - an advocacy group that campaigns in support of international freedom of expression - 20 Mainland writers were, this weekend, forcibly prevented from attending a PEN conference held in Hong Kong. Reports indicate that the writers were threatened by security forces, and warned not to attend the conference. Those who ignored the warning were stopped at the border and had their travel papers seized.

The conference, held from Friday 2 February to Monday 5 February, debated the role of writers in society, ways to encourage Chinese language writers, and methods to improve communication and cooperation between different regions. It also discussed new and recurring threats to freedom of expression.

We control the horizontal and the vertical

To date, Beijing insists that it alone has the right direct the nature and work of writers in China, and has placed a prohibition on books or publications which decent  from the official state line on history, politics and society, or which discuss so-called "gray topics" - such as the growing difference between rich and poor, or the harm caused by certain government policies.

Beijing has also acted to ensure that writers and intellectuals only communicate through approved channels which can be monitored and directed along accepted state lines.

Staying Put

In a separate incident, Chinese security forces also detained well Gao Yaojie, one of the doctor who helped to exposed the true scale and nature of China's HIV/AIDS epidemic.

According to friends and colleagues, Gao was due to be honored by the Vital Voices Global Partnership in ceremony in Washington. However, when officials learned of this, they ordered security forces in Henan to put her under virtual house arrest in order to prevent her applying for the necessary travel documents.

This latest detention comes after an incident in 2001, in which Gao was refused a passport in order to prevent her from personally accepting an award issued by a UN sponsored body.

Now in her 80s Gao humiliated Beijing when she publicly revealed how blood selling services had contaminated countless Chinese with HIV/AIDS.

Hong Kong - Mainland

Although China and Hong Kong are officially the same country, Mainland citizens still require special permission to travel to Hong Kong and Hong Kong citizen can also be prohibited from traveling to the Mainland.

Refusal of authority to travel between Hong Kong and the Mainland is commonly used as a means of preventing Mainland citizens from using Hong Kong's less restricted media to spread messages that contradict or debunk the official state line, or as a means of punishing pro-democracy Hong Kong citizens with family on the Mainland.

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