Lawyer Calls for Release of Dissident Writer Liu Xiaobo

The lawyer for a prominent Chinese writer secretly detained six months ago called on authorities Monday, June 8 to free his client or formally charge him.

Dissident author Liu Xiaobo was taken away by police on Dec. 8, a day before the publication of a document he co-authored appealing for sweeping political reform in China.

He has not been charged. A rights group says police have been keeping him in a suburban Beijing hotel.

His lawyer, Mo Shaoping, said authorities must release or formally charge Liu because China's criminal law limits the kind of soft detention he has been under to six months.

"Today is the six-month mark," said Mo. "At the very least, they need to use some other kind of measure to keep him, such as issuing a formal notice of arrest or detention, or releasing him on bail. If not, then he needs to be let go."

Mo said he will submit a letter to authorities formally arguing for Liu's release. He said he does not know where Liu is being held.

The San Francisco-based Dui Hua Foundation said in a statement that Liu was being detained in a hotel in the Beijing suburbs. The hotel was not named.

Liu, 53, is a former university professor who spent 20 months in jail for joining the 1989 student-led protests in Tiananmen Square.

In his writings, most published only on the Internet, Liu has strongly called for civil rights and political reform, making him subject to routine harassment by authorities.

He was among more than 300 lawyers, writers, scholars and artists who signed "Charter 08" in December calling for a new constitution guaranteeing human rights, election of public officials, freedom of religion and expression, and an end to the Communist Party's hold over the military, courts and government.