News reports from China indicate that AIDS and gay rights activist Wan Yanhai has gone missing, apparently detained by local authorities in Bejing since last Friday, on the eve of an international workshop he was organizing, now cancelled, on AIDs and blood transmission. In 2002, he was arrested and detained for about a month after he circulated a report on the serious situation in Henan Province relating to AIDS transmission, where thousands of villagers were infected.
On our next edition of Subversity, this Monday, November 27, 2006 from 9-10 am west coast time, we'll discuss his pioneering work organizing a local Chinese NGO, most recently Beijing Zhiaixing Information Counseling Center (the former Beijing Aizhixing Health Education Institute), that provides AIDS education and advocacy in China, which faces a rising AIDS epidemic, according to latest United Nations projections.
His NGO is the recipient of grants from a host of foundations in the west and is also supported by the British Embassy. He was also a New Century Fulbright Scholar in 2001 when he explored sexual abstinence education promoted by the Unification Church and others in China. He was also a visiting scholar at the Center for Feminist Research at USC (1997-1998).
Wan, who has lived in Orange County and in Los Angeles, is profiled in the San Jose Mercury News in an essay written by the host of Subversity.
Subversity airs Mondays 9-10 a.m. on the west coast, on KUCI, 88.9 fm in Orange County, and is simulcast on the web at kuci.org.
He is a previous guest on a Subversity Show on Political Spying that aired on January 20, 1998. He is interviewed in the second half-hour of the audio.
Subversity first aired on KUCI in September 2003.
Links:
Observer (UK) story:
Top China Aids critic 'is
seized'
London Times story:
Police Snatch AIDS
Campaigner
Washington Post story:
AIDS
Activist Is Detained On Eve of Meeting in China
Research paper:
"The
Limits of Official Tolerance: The Case of Aizhixing" by Albert
Chen
His NGO's 2005 report
Fulbright entry on Wan
Photos of Wan in
1997-98
Audio files are archived on the Subversity website:
kuci.org/~dtsang.
Thanx for listening.
dan
Daniel C. Tsang Host, Subversity "What's behind and beyond the Orange Curtain" Mondays 9-10 a.m. on 88.9 fm, kuci.org KUCI talk page: http://kuci.org/talk/ Subversity: http://kuci.org/~dtsang E-mail: subversity@kuci.org Daniel Tsang, KUCI, PO Box 4362, Irvine CA 92616, USA Member, National Writers' Union, http://www.nwu.org NWU is the nation's only labor union for freelancers Member, UC-AFT Local 2226 at UC Irvine _______________________________________________ KUCI.org 88.9FM - "eclectic music, engaging talk"