As a human rights lawyer in China, Wang Yu is used to government scrutiny. She is regularly followed, arrested or detained by the police. But today, her freedom is being curtailed in a new way: with the zero-covid policy. Wang has been struggling for months with her health code, the technology that indicates contamination risk in China and determines everyone’s freedom of movement. As a result, she has been unable to enter Beijing, where she lives and works, for almost three months.
“This is having an impact on my life and my work,” Wang said by telephone from Sichuan Province, where she is temporarily staying with friends. Her husband, human rights lawyer Bao Longjun, can no longer enter Beijing due to a deviating health code. Wang: ‘I have some lawsuits in Beijing that I urgently need to return to, but I can’t do that right now. I can’t go home, but have to stay with family or friends. That is sometimes uncomfortable.’
The Chinese government introduced the health code in early 2020 as a tool to contain the covid virus. Human rights lawyers and government critics report that technology is increasingly being used to restrict their freedom of movement. They have been experiencing abuse of their codes since last year, with a huge increase since early October, ahead of the Party Congress where party leader Xi Jinping stepped up his power. Even now that the Party Congress is over, the manipulation of their codes continues.
The health code is a form of surveillance technology, which is the basis of China’s zero-covid policy. Every Chinese has an app on his smartphone that keeps track of location, travel history and test results. A green code is required to travel by (public) transport, to enter businesses, shops and parks, and in some cities even to enter your own neighborhood. The code is checked at the entrance, and is linked to transport reservation systems.
In the event of contact with an infected person, staying in a location with infections or an abnormal or missing test, the health code turns yellow or red, or a pop-up appears in the app. It disappears – depending on the reason for the deviating code – after extra testing, quarantine or staying at a location without infections. Local authorities each have their own version of the code, with slight variations. The one in the capital Beijing is known for being the strictest.
Political control
Under Chinese law, the health code may only be used for epidemic control, but appears to be increasingly used for political control. De Volkskrant spoke to five Chinese government critics with a deviant code, which has prevented them from traveling to Beijing for at least a month, and which restricts some of them in their daily mobility. Four of them said they knew dozens of fellow sufferers. This mainly concerns human rights lawyers and ‘petitioners’ – citizens who have a conflict with their local government and who want to travel to Beijing to file objections with higher authorities.
“Restrictions have gradually worsened from the start of the epidemic until now, but have peaked since Oct. 1,,” said Wang Yu (51). At the end of August, she received a pop-up in her Beijing health code, ostensibly because of staying in a risk zone. She was then in Jilin, in northern China, where there were no infections. “All the lawyers and petitioners I know have such a pop-up. There are certainly several dozen. In all of China it is probably thousands of people.’
“I know of dozens of cases in Suzhou,” says human rights lawyer Ren Quanniu (42), who also has a pop-up in his Beijing code. He temporarily resides in Suzhou, a city west of Shanghai. He also thinks that there are thousands of people across the country. ‘I think 70 to 80 percent of petitioners have a pop-up. It is clear to everyone that the government is using the epidemic to keep people under control.’
Earlier this year, the local government of Zhengzhou city was discredited after it was revealed that they had manipulated the health codes of victims in a banking scandal to prevent demonstrations. Higher authorities called this illegal, announced an investigation and punished five officials. But the new testimonials show that the misuse of the zero-covid technology is on a much larger scale in China, with the participation of numerous local authorities.
“They can stop us with just our phone, they don’t need anything else,” said Feng Jiawen, 53, a Hangzhou petitioner who has been involved in an expropriation case since 2007 and who regularly travels to Beijing to file appeals. Since last year, her actions have been restricted through her health code of Hangzhou, and that of Beijing. ‘Those pop-ups are all human work. They are intended to limit our freedom in a veiled way.’
Incorrect pop-up
Ordinary Chinese also have many problems with their health code. The technology has been tuned very sensitively, so as not to miss any infections, and regularly imposes unjustified restrictions. The Beijing code is especially notorious: many residents get stuck outside Beijing because of pop-ups. Social media is full of complaints about the lengthy waiting times at helpline 12345, where people can challenge an unjustified pop-up. Beijing’s city government has recently promised to improve, and the Chinese government announced a more lenient implementation of its zero-covid policy on Friday.
But in so-called ‘key groups’, such as lawyers and petitioners, the deviant codes seem to be linked to political events and activities. For example, petitioner Feng Jiawen saw her Hangzhou code turn yellow last year after taking a PCR test, which could then be considered a signal of travel plans. Local officials warned her not to travel to Beijing by phone. Her Hangzhou code also turned yellow during the Winter Olympics in Beijing, which severely limited her freedom of movement. Feng has also had a pop-up in its Beijing code since the beginning of October.
A petitioner friend of Feng managed to reach Beijing, but got a pop-up when he made a reservation for Tiananmen Square. Since the end of last year, the politically sensitive square has been subject to a reservation obligation, officially due to covid. Once his visiting time was up, the pop-up disappeared again. Also in Suzhou and Hangzhou, petitioners report that their code is influenced by their travel intentions. Lawyer Ren Quanniu: ‘They have a green code, until they buy a train ticket or arrive at a train station, then a pop-up appears. That is purposeful.’
The codes of human rights lawyers seem to be manipulated to hinder their work. Wang Yu was given a yellow code in March this year while attending a trial in Datong, a city in Shanxi province. She was in danger of being quarantined. As she quickly left, her code jumped green again. ‘That yellow code had nothing to do with the epidemic, it had specific intentions,’ Wang says. “They are using the epidemic to cover up all kinds of illegal acts.”
While ordinary Chinese can correct an incorrect code via helpline 12345, this does not seem to work for ‘key groups’. Fang Wenqin (53), a lawyer in Suzhou who himself is fighting an expropriation with the government, has had a pop-up for Beijing since the beginning of October, even though there are no infections in Suzhou. Whenever she challenges that decision via helpline 12345, the pop-up disappears, but as soon as she buys a train ticket, the pop-up reappears. “That’s happened four or five times now,” says Fang. “I stopped calling today, I don’t trust them anymore.”
Painful consequences
For Fang, the consequences are particularly painful: her seriously ill husband also has a pop-up, and can therefore not go to a specialized hospital in Beijing. “The government thinks I want to file an appeal in Beijing, but I just want to go to the hospital with my husband,” says Fang. ‘I’m very worried about him, he needs urgent help. I don’t understand why we ordinary people have to suffer like this. We can only sit at home waiting to die.’
Lawyer Wang Yu appealed to helpline 12345 more than ten times to no avail. In October, she was told by the Chinese National Security Police that she was not welcome in Beijing during the Party Congress. But even now she still can’t go back. ‘I thought it might be because of the visit of the German Chancellor Scholz (on November 4, red.), because I used to meet his predecessor Merkel. But it’s already gone, and I still have a pop-up.”
Amnesty International also says it is concerned about the improper use of the health code. “The extent to which the Chinese government uses this instrument has clearly increased,” said researcher Kai Ong. “It’s also heartbreaking on a personal level. Not only does it stop activism, but it also prevents people from living their lives. Something as simple as visiting your family has become a difficult task.’
Ordinary Chinese who run into a wall of blocked health codes sometimes try to get out of it through shortcuts. They take a train to a station halfway through their final destination, and try to circumvent the electronic restrictions during the journey. Or they cross the provincial border by car or on foot via small roads, to avoid checks. Wang Yu also tried to reach Beijing with a train ticket to an intermediate station, but was taken off the train halfway through. Control is stricter for “key groups,” she says.
Five lawyers, including Wang Yu, Ren Quanniu and Fang Wenqin, filed a complaint against Beijing health authorities this month. It is unlikely that their complaint will be considered. “In this country, the law is completely useless for our kind of people,” Ren says. “But we have filed a complaint anyway. It (the government, red.) are gangsters, and we want everyone to know they are gangsters. We want everyone to see it.’
De Volkskrant made a request for response by telephone, fax and e-mail to five responsible national and local authorities, but received no response.
Corona in China
The Chinese government announced a easing of zero-covid rules on Friday, despite major outbreaks across the country. The duration of the quarantine for inbound travelers will be reduced from ten to eight days, and airlines will no longer be penalized if they bring too many positive passengers into the country. With infections, fewer contacts and a smaller environment go into lockdown, and quarantines for at-risk persons are shorter.
The easing is striking, just as China reports new record numbers of infections. On Friday, 10,535 new cases were counted in China, the largest number since the end of April. This time, the virus is mainly raging in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou. Strict restrictions apply throughout the city, but a lockdown has not yet been introduced – except for one district. The new line appears to be intended to accommodate the economy and increasingly critical population. At the same time, the zero-covid policy remains in force, and it remains to be seen in practice how the new rules will be applied.