BEIJING, March 30 (UPI) -- A human rights activist in western China has been arrested on subversion charges, an advocacy group said Wednesday.
China Human Rights Defenders said Chen Wei was charged in Sichuan Monday and his family notified Tuesday, The New York Times reported.
Chen is the third democracy activist in the province to be charged recently with inciting subversion, following Ran Yunfei and Ding Mao.
Sichuan, known as center of dissent, has also taken the lead in repressing it lately, the group says.
On Friday, a court there sentenced longtime activist Liu Xianbin, a veteran democracy activist, to 10 years for defaming the Communist Party in his writings.
ChinaGeeks.org, a Web site in Beijing, says about 50 Chinese have been detained, arrested or made to disappear in a crackdown to prevent the Arab revolutions from inspiring China.
One of them is Yang Hengjun, a Chinese-Australian spy novelist and democracy blogger who disappeared Sunday after reportedly making a call from the Guangzhou airport, saying three men were following him.
On Wednesday, three friends of Yang said he had phoned them to say he was in a hospital. They speculate he really is being held at a secret location.
