St. Petersburg Times
June 25, 2006

‘Fu Xiancai, once a subsistence farmer who was forced off his land by China’s Three Gorges Dam project, has violated the cardinal rule in this Communist country. He has refused to shut up.’

Fu Xiancai, once a subsistence farmer who was forced off his land by China’s Three Gorges Dam project, has violated the cardinal rule in this Communist country. He has refused to shut up. Now Fu, 47, lies in a hospital bed in Yichang, the city closest to the massive dam. He is likely paralyzed for life. Fu’s neck was broken during an attack by an unknown assailant on June 8 shortly after he left the local police station in his village of Zigui. … St. Petersburg Times photographer Bob Croslin and I interviewed Fu about a year ago during a month-long visit to China. I was preparing a number of stories on the stunning rise of capitalism and increasing wealth in China. But I wanted to acknowledge that the burst of economic freedom was occurring within the confines of an unyielding authoritarian regime. To read those stories, go to http://www.sptimes.com/china. … Fu, who stood barely 5-feet tall and was so slight his belt nearly encircled his waist twice, never hesitated to speak out against corrupt local officials whom he said embezzled funds intended for peasants. He made more than 28 trips to provincial authorities and six trips to Beijing with petitions signed by thousands of peasants. He also spoke to foreign journalists as often as possible, even though the reporters were often detained by police after such interviews (as we were for six hours) and such incidents only raised the level of harassment against Fu. In the past year, an anonymous caller told Fu his son would be killed if he didn’t come up with a large sum of money; intruders burst into his home and beat him with wooden poles, breaking his leg; thugs using police batons put a gash in his head and someone placed funeral wreaths outside Fu’s home.