Remembering Liu Xiaobo

Photo credit: Liu Xia/EPA

Nobel Laureate, Liu Xiaobo died on Thursday 13th July having been released from prison on medical parole earlier this year. He had been in prison for 11 years following calls he made for democratic reform in China. Instrumental in the Tiananmen Square pro-democracy protests of 1989, where he participated in a hunger strike and brokered a peaceful exit for students who remained in the square, Liu’s commitment to democracy and human rights has been unwavering in spite of the risks. After his arrest, the Nobel committee awarded him the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize, an award the Chinese state refers to as “a blasphemy’.

Liu Xiaobo was an honorary member of Scottish PEN. Along with numerous other PEN centres around the world, Scottish PEN campaigned for Liu’s freedom and reform of human rights in China. Scottish PEN worked on a project with pupils of Lomond School in Helensburgh to construct ‘A Chair for Xiaobo’. The chair was transported to Oslo in time for the presentation of Liu’s 2010 Nobel Prize. It was made with the hope that one day Liu Xiaobo would come to claim his chair. Scottish PEN will continue to campaign for the right of Liu Xia, Liu Xiaobo’s widow, to have the freedom to travel and, hopefully, one day to come to Oslo to claim the chair as her inheritance.

The chair now sits on permanent display in the House of Literature, Oslo.

Liu Xiaobo – Drew Campbell

Liu Xiaobo was a husband, lover and friend.

Liu Xiaobo was a poet, scholar and literary critic.

Liu Xiaobo was an activist for democracy, justice and freedom of expression.

Liu Xiaobo was.

Liu Xiaobo was an organiser at Tiananmen Square in 1989.

Liu Xiaobo was a founder of the Independent Chinese PEN Center in 2001.

Liu Xiaobo was a contributor to ‘Charter 08’, a manifesto for human rights in China.

Liu Xiaobo was.

Liu Xiaobo was arrested on 10^th December 2009 for “advocating subversion”.

Liu Xiaobo was tried and sentenced to eleven year imprisonment.

Liu Xiaobo was placed in solitary confinement.

Liu Xiaobo was.

Liu Xiaobo was awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace in 2010, the first to a Chinese citizen.

Liu Xiaobo was denied the right to travel to collect his award.

Liu Xiaobo was a prisoner of the Chinese regime.

Liu Xiaobo was.

Liu Xiaobo was diagnosed with liver cancer in May 2017.

Liu Xiaobo was denied vital medical treatment abroad.

Liu Xiaobo was declared dead on 13^th July 2017.

Liu Xiaobo was.

Liu Xiaobo said at his trial “I have no enemies.”

Liu Xiaobo wrote “Walls of a cell may confine the body, but no cell can restrain the soul.”

Liu Xiaobo is a symbol of peaceful resistance.

Liu Xiaobo is an inspiration to us all.

Liu Xiaobo is.

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