Korean and international AIDS activists who participated in a peaceful protest against the Free Trade Agreement and for access to AIDS treatment at the International Conference on AIDS in Asia and the Pacific (ICAAP) were shoved and dragged by the police while trying to prevent the arrest of AIDS lawyer Jang Seo-yeon. Two activists, including a staff person of the ICAAP Local Organizing Committee, were hospitalized. Below is the joint statement from Korean activists and supporters about the incident.
[URGENT APPEAL] Tian Xi Expected Out from Prison
According to friends of Chinese AIDS activist Tian Xi, he is expected to complete his prison sentence and be released on August 18, 2011. His family income is quite low, and they have no way to meet his medical costs. Friends and family have issued a call for donations to the following account.
Account name: TIAN Xi
Bank: Bank of China
Runan Branch 中国银行汝南支行
Account number: 254608370972
[NEWS] Chinese, Thai, US Groups Join to Train AIDS Activists in Human Rights
Award-winning rights advocates from China and Thailand are
joining together to train grassroots HIV/AIDS groups in human rights
skills. Their first manual, Prove It: Documenting Rights Abuses was published on World AIDS Day, December 1st. English press release (pdf) Chinese press release (pdf) Read more and download the manual/下载课本。
[NEWS] Put People with AIDS in China’s Congress
[:en]This week’s blog entry is an open letter from AIDS activists Li Xige and Tian Xi calling on the National People’s Congress to appoint people with HIV/AIDS as representatives. The authors invoke Party quotes to support their argument. The demand (which comes all the way at the end) breaks new ground. Currently, there are no HIV-positive representatives in China’s Congress – or, that is, none that we know of.
[NEWS] Treatment…and rumors of treatment
[:en]Word has it that China may finally be about to provide second-line treatment to some people with HIV/AIDS.
On a recent trip to China, people with AIDS told AC that roughly one in five of the people they knew living with HIV were at the point where they needed second-line treatment. Duan Jun, an activist from Henan province, said that roughly 40 percent of the people he knew needed second-line. Those numbers are deeply worrying. Just a year ago, we translated a letter from a group of Chinese AIDS activists demanding second-line treatment immediately.
