Yang Jianli was born on Lanling County, Linyi, southern Shandong, China, August 15,1963 and is a Chinese dissident with a United States residency.
15 Facts About Yang Jianli
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Yang Jianli is the son of a Communist Party leader.
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Yang Jianli now lives in the United States, where he is a human rights activist.
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Yang Jianli was blacklisted by the government of the People's Republic of China, which refused to renew his passport, because of his political activism.
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Yang Jianli returned to China in April 2002 on a friend's passport to view labor unrest in northeast China.
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Yang Jianli was detained when trying to board a domestic flight, and held incommunicado by the Chinese in violation of their own and international law.
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On May 28,2003, a United Nations working group on arbitrary detention ruled that Yang Jianli had been held by the Chinese government in violation of international law.
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However, Yang Jianli first insisted on returning to his hometown to sweep his father's tomb.
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In March 2016, together with Fang Zheng and Zhou Fengsuo, Yang Jianli published an op-ed in The Washington Post protesting Donald Trump's characterization of the Tiananmen Square Massacre as the act of a "strong, powerful government".
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Yang Jianli has been a guest speaker at the Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy on several occasions, and is the founder of the NGO, Initiatives for China, a US-based organisation dedicated to working for a peaceful transition to democracy in China.
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Yang Jianli established the Foundation for China in the 21st Century.
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In June 2016, Yang Jianli organised an event in Washington DC to commemorate the 27th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square crackdown in China.
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In March 2018, Yang Jianli was invited to speak by the advocacy group UN Watch at the UN Human Rights Council but Chinese diplomat Chen Cheng repeatedly interrupted in a failed attempt to halt the address.
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In 2020, Yang Jianli applied for United States citizenship but was rejected due to his former membership in the Chinese Communist Party.
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Yang Jianli is a primary target of the Chinese government's disinformation networks.