Deutsche Welle
July 28, 2006

Seven weeks after a brutal attack on activist Fu Xiancai, authorities in China say preliminary results of the investigation into the assault show that Fu fell and then caused the injuries himself.

Chinese officials claim that a dissident who gave an interview to German TV hurt himself rather than being severely beaten by police as his family alleges. Seven weeks after a brutal attack on the Chinese environmental activist Fu Xiancai, authorities in China say that preliminary results of the investigation into the assault show that Fui fell and then caused the injuries himself. "There is no proof that the injuries were inflicted by an outside force, therefore the investigation is closed," the report by local police said. A forensic examination conducted by Chinese authorities claimed Fu, now paralyzed from the neck down, fell and then beat himself. Fu was so badly beaten after giving an interview to German state broadcaster ARD that his spine was broken. In the May interview, Fu criticized the compensation offered by the government to residents displaced by the building of the Three Gorges Dam on the Yangtze River. … Marianne Heuwagen of Human Rights Watch Germany, said the investigation was far from satisfactory. "The explanation is a farce," she said. "Obviously the same authorities responsible for the attack have decided it didn’t even take place"