Famous democracy activist and human rights activist Qin Yongmin, sentenced to 13 years, will spend his 73rd birthday in prison; he has spent a cumulative 33 years and 7 months in Chinese Communist Party prisons to date

(Rights Protection Network Information Center report) On August 11, 2026, this website learned that August 11, 2026, is the 73rd birthday of Mr. Qin Yongmin, a famous democracy activist and human rights activist sentenced to 13 years in prison. To date, he has spent a cumulative 33 years and 7 months in Chinese Communist Party prisons.

On July 11, 2018, Qin Yongmin was again sentenced to 13 years for subversion of state power. This was his fourth prison sentence, bringing his cumulative sentences to 35 years. He is currently serving his sentence at Guanghua Prison in Qianjiang City, Hubei Province.

Qin Yongmin biography: Born on August 11, 1953, he is a native of Ezhou, Hubei Province. In his early years, he was an employee of the cold-rolling plant of Wuhan Iron and Steel Company in Hubei Province. He is a famous independent political scholar, freelance writer, important founder of the Hubei Provincial Party Branch of the China Democracy Party, chairman of “China Human Rights Watch” (in the process of registration), head of the “Rose China Team,” a famous human rights activist, and a political prisoner in China.

Since 1970, he has been illegally arrested and detained by the Chinese Communist Party authorities 45 times, for a cumulative period of more than 22 years, and is known as “the conscience of China”; in 1976 and 1978, he attracted the authorities’ attention and displeasure for participating in the “April Fifth” Movement and independently launching the Wuhan Democracy Wall movement, founding the democracy periodical The Bell, and participating in efforts to bring about the establishment of the China National Association of People-Run Periodicals; in 1981, he was illegally kidnapped by the authorities for founding publications and persistently and actively exploring the creation of democratic political parties in China; in March 1982, he and more than 10 national Democracy Wall movement leaders were sentenced by the authorities to eight years in prison for “counterrevolutionary propaganda and incitement”; in April 1989, he was released after completing his sentence.

In 1993, he expressed dissenting views on the 1989 June Fourth Tiananmen incident, opposed Beijing’s bid to host the Olympics, held an international press conference in Beijing, and publicly debated Wu Chongyuan, head of China’s Olympic bid committee, arousing the authorities’ extreme displeasure; on November 14, 1993, he was arrested by Wuhan police and sentenced to two years of reeducation through labor for drafting and launching the Peace Charter movement in Beijing and proposing the strategic ideas of “national reconciliation, human rights above all, benign interaction, and peaceful transition”; in June 1997, he actively helped establish the “China Human Rights Watch” organization, served as its chairman, and from March 1998 to 1999 released more than 450 reports on human rights information in China to the international community; in September 1998, he was criminally detained by Wuhan police on suspicion of “subversion of state power” for actively organizing the Hubei Provincial Party Branch of the China Democracy Party and serving as its spokesperson. He was subsequently sentenced to 12 years in prison under the same charge, deprived of political rights for three years, and served his sentence at Hanyang Prison in Hubei Province; on November 29, 2010, he was released after completing his sentence.

In 2011, he was subjected to harsh repression by the authorities after resuming the work of “China Human Rights Watch,” publishing more than 200 human rights information reports, and launching multiple campaigns to aid political victims, including Liu Xiaobo, Wang Bingzhang, Li Wangyang, Gao Zhisheng, Liu Benqi, and Cao Shunli. In less than a year, he was summoned 25 times, subjected to administrative detention and illegal detention more than 10 times, and had his home raided more than 10 times; in 2013, together with rights-protecting citizens Liu Xinglian, Pan Lu, and others, he established the online channel “Rose China Team,” proposed the 16-character service mission of “national reconciliation, human rights above all, benign interaction, and peaceful transition,” and continuously published open letters to Xi Jinping, the newly appointed general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party, recommending that the Chinese Communist Party initiate a dialogue mechanism between the government and opposition, carry out political system reform, pursue a peaceful transition, achieve democratic constitutional government, and call for the establishment nationwide of a broad coalition of constructive opposition forces, for which he again faced strong repression; in December 2013, while traveling through Henan to handle personal affairs and intending to go to Beijing to continue matters related to his registration application, he was kidnapped and taken back to Wuhan by police from the Qingshan District of Wuhan City, and was administratively detained for nine days. He was thereafter kept under close surveillance and forbidden to leave Wuhan; in January 2014, he again jointly launched and formally applied to register “China Human Rights Watch” with more than 100 founders, and served as its first chairman of the board, but by July 2015, the organization’s registration had been rejected by the Beijing Ministry of Civil Affairs for various reasons.

On January 9, 2015, he was again arrested by Wuhan’s domestic security police and officers from the Xingouqiao Police Station in Qingshan District. The alleged offense was “accepting too many interviews with foreign media and writing too many articles.” His wife was also taken away that same day, and she has been unreachable ever since; in August 2015, Wuhan police in Hubei Province placed him under residential surveillance at a designated location on suspicion of “inciting subversion of state power”; on June 17, 2016, he was again indicted by the Wuhan Procuratorate on the charge of “subversion of state power.” The trial began on the morning of May 11, 2018, and ended on the morning of May 12, 2018.

The Qin Yongmin case was finally publicly pronounced at 9 a.m. on July 11, 2018, in Courtroom No. 3 of the Wuhan Intermediate Court. Qin Yongmin was sentenced to 13 years in prison for subversion of state power and deprived of political rights for three years. He appealed the verdict, but after a second-instance ruling by the Wuhan Intermediate Court, the original judgment was upheld, with his sentence running until January 20, 2028.

He was previously held at Wuhan No. 2 Detention Center, under the secret code name 701. He is currently serving his sentence in the Tenth Prison District of Guanghua Prison in Qianjiang, Hubei Province.