China Jails Quake Activist

Activist detained after trying to help bereaved parents

(NEWSER) - An activist who tried to help bereaved Sichuan parents get answers about why so many schools collapsed in May's earthquake has been arrested, the New York Times reports. Huang Qi was taken away by plainclothes police after posting information about the parents on his website. He has been accused of possessing state secrets and could face years in jail. More»

Police stake out whistleblower's studio, shut down blog

(NEWSER) - The Chinese artist who has made investigating the deaths of children in the Sichuan earthquake a personal crusade is facing a government crackdown, reports the CBC. Ai Weiwei's widely read blog has been deleted, and plainclothes police officers are staking out his studio in Beijing. Ai has relaunched his blog on an American server but said, "I don't know how long it will last before it is blocked." More»

Hundreds remarry in quake-devastated Chinese city

(NEWSER) - A year after the quake that devastated China's Sichuan province, many survivors have new loves if not new homes, the Guardian reports. In Beichuan—where only 4,000 of the town's 22,000 people survived—some 600 widows and widowers have remarried, and the government hopes more will soon follow as the town rebuilds. More»

A year after disaster, Ai Weiwei leads efforts to account for the dead

(NEWSER) - China today marked one year since the Sichuan earthquake that left nearly 90,000 people dead or missing. But the government has still not published results of an investigation, and parents whose children died in shoddily constructed schools have faced police intimidation. The parents have found an unlikely advocate, Time reports: Ai Weiwei, a star artist who has relentlessly pressed for information. More»

(NEWSER) - The devastation is still raw from the earthquake that snuffed out thousands of young lives in rural China a year ago, reports the Los Angeles Times, but many grieving parents have found new hope in the form of another baby. More than 10% of new mothers in one Sichuan Province hospital had lost children in the quake—a grief that was only intensified by China's single-child policy. More»