Published by: World Tibet Network News, Tuesday, October 29, 1996

by Giles Hewitt

BEIJING, Oct 29 (AFP) - Chinese dissident Wang Dan stands trial for his life here Wednesday, although his fate will certainly have been sealed long before he enters the dock at Beijing's Number One Intermediate Court.

The former student leader of the 1989 pro-democracy movement faces several counter-revolutionary charges, including the most serious of "plotting to subvert the government," which carries a minimum sentence of 10 years imprisonment and a maximum sentence of death.

In a judicial system where the guilt of the accused is more or less assumed and trials merely a process for deciding sentences, Wang's chances of being found not guilty are virtually nil.

According to the documents received by his family, Wang's trial is officially "open," but the reality of China's opaque judicial process was brought home by official refusal to even confirm the date of the hearing.

As of late Monday, both the court and the State Council Information Department said they had no date for the start of the trial -- even though the family was told last week that it would open October 30.

"It is very hard to try and forecast what is going to happen," said Wang's mother Wang Lingyun, who will be part of her son's defence team in the courtroom.

"We don't expect the trial to last more than one or maybe two days at the most, but I don't even know if the court is calling any witnesses against Wang Dan," she said.

The defence has written testimonies from two exiled dissidents in the United States -- Wang Juntao and Cheng Zhen -- refuting charges that Wang Dan conspired with them to undermine the Chinese government.

Few expect Wang, 27, to receive the death penalty, with most observers forecasting a prison term longer than the four years he received for his role in the 1989 movement, but shorter than the 14 years handed down to China's most celebrated dissident, Wei Jingsheng, in December last year.

"What is clear from previous practice, is that whatever the verdict, it won't be decided by the presiding judge," said Robin Munro, the Hong Kong director of Human Rights Watch Asia.

"Like so many others, this trial is simply a pro-forma exercise, with the verdict and sentence pre-ordained -- probably at the politburo level," Munro said.

It is Wang Lingyun's presence on the defence team that presents the one potential spanner in the works for the judges, especially as she has vowed personally to rebut some of the charges in court.

"That could prove to be quite an embarrassment to the bench," Munro commented.

Wang's trial and certain incarceration puts the final nail in the coffin of China's dissident movement, with every activist of note now in prison or sidelined in foreign exile.

Prominent 1989 activist Liu Xiaobo was sentenced earlier this month to three years in a re-education through labour camp for penning an appeal for Tibetan autonomy and political reforms.

Co-author and veteran dissident Wang Xizhe managed to escape into US exile a week later.

"The government has effectively wiped out the Chinese dissident movement for the forseeable future," Munro said.

The situation will be a source of considerable embarrassment for US Secretary of State Warren Christopher when he arrives in Beijing next month for a visit seen as crucial to improved Sino-US relations.

Christopher and other high-ranking US officials who have come here in the past few years, have repeatedly stressed that the human rights situation in China can only be improved through a policy of "constructive engagement" -- that stresses dialogue above overt political pressure.