Source: www.MNNonline.org
Date: July 18. 2023
The wife and son of Dr. Li Baiguang, the Chinese Christian human rights attorney who died under suspicious circumstances in 2018, have escaped to the United States, according to the Christian nonprofit groups ChinaAid and Voice of the Martyrs Korea.
Hanmei “Hannah” Xu and Qingxin “Pure Heart” Li arrived in the United States last month and are presently seeking asylum.
Dr. Li Baiguang, known for his self-described “ant strategy” of traveling around China to take up hundreds of individual cases defending the religious freedom and human rights of ordinary citizens, rose to prominence internationally after receiving an award from the Washington-based National Endowment for Democracy in 2008 and being invited for three visits with then-U.S. President George W. Bush.
Dr. Li reported to international observers that he had been abducted, beaten, and threatened with dismemberment by Chinese officials in Zhejiang province in October 2017 for defending farmers whose land was seized by the government. Then on February 25, 2018, Dr. Li was pronounced dead at a Chinese government military hospital in Nanjing, hours after allegedly checking in for a stomach complaint. The hospital said he had bled to death due to a liver condition.
But Dr Li, who was 49 at the time of his death was reported by friends and colleagues to have been in good health without liver disease immediately prior to the announcement of his death.
“Since Dr. Li’s sudden death in early 2018, his wife, Hanmei Xu, has been closely controlled and monitored without freedom of movement by agents arranged by the Communist Party of China in order to prevent her from having contact with anyone overseas,” says the Rev. Dr. Bob Fu, the founder and President of US-based ChinaAid and a long-time friend of the family.
Hanmei Xu released the following statement: “After much suffering in China, with the help of ChinaAid and Voice of the Martyrs Korea, we are glad to finally arrive in the USA, land of freedom. We thank all brothers, sisters, and other friends of the international community who have been praying and caring about Li Baiguang and our whole family.”
“Psalm 146:9 says, ‘The Lord watches over the sojourners; he upholds the widow and the fatherless, but the way of the wicked he brings to ruin’,” says Voice of the Martyrs Korea’s Dr. Hyun Sook Foley. “The Lord has upheld Hannah and Pure Heart since February 2018. In the end, the little ant’s patient, persistent fight against wickedness will be upheld by the Lord as well.”
