Members of the academic, research and legal professional communities are invited to sign this appeal on behalf of Chinese human rights lawyer TANG Jitian (唐吉田), who is prevented from visiting his daughter critically ill in Japan.
Please consider signing and use this link to submit your name and affiliation: https://forms.gle/JynhYMNFpDxb8Bet6.
The letter is open to signatures until May 31, 2021 (Eastern Time). For any questions, please contact lawyertangjitian@gmail.com. Thank you!
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An appeal on behalf of lawyer Tang Jitian
We, the undersigned concerned scholars and legal professionals, are writing on behalf of lawyer Tang Jitian, who is desperately trying to travel to Japan to see his daughter, critically ill with tuberculosis and hospitalized in an ICU.
As a prominent human rights lawyer, Tang has been stripped of his license to practice law and unlawfully banned from leaving China since 2010. According to Article 13(2) of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, “everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.” Yet like many other human rights defenders, including, since January this year, Guo Feixiong (aka Yang Maodong), Tang has been told that his leaving the country would endanger national security in ways never specified by the authorities.
We call on the Chinese government to allow Tang to go to Japan to assist his daughter on humanitarian grounds and to respect its human rights obligations.
【中文翻译】声援唐吉田律师之呼吁信
我们（以下联署者）是一群关注中国之学者，研究人员以及法律人，谨以此信表达我们对唐吉田律师之声援。唐律师现正焦急地试图前往日本探望他病危的女儿，他的女儿因肺结核目前在日本重症监护病房接受治疗。
唐吉田律师是中国知名的人权律师，自2010年起被剥夺律师执业证，并被非法禁止离开中国。根据《世界人权宣言》第13条第2款：「人人有权离开任何国家，包括其本国在内，并有权返回他的国家。」然而，与许多其他人权捍卫者一样——包括自今年一月起亦被禁止离境的维权人士郭飞雄（又名杨茂东）——唐律师被告知他若离开中国将会危害国家安全，当局却从未明确告知其离境将如何危害国安。
我们呼吁中国政府基于人道主义，尊重其人权义务，允许唐吉田律师前往日本照顾其女儿。
SIGNATORIES / 联署者:
(as of May 31, 2021):
Tomoko Ako, The University of Tokyo
Björn Alpermann, University of Würzburg
Yoshihisa Amae, Chang Jung Christian University
Noriyuki Asano, Kansai University
Hermann Aubié, University of Turku
Jean-Philippe Béja, National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS)
Teng Biao, University of Chicago
Richard Blum, attorney
Gill H. Boehringer, International Association of People’s Lawyers
Michel Bonnin, EHESS-Paris
Joseph A. Bosco, Georgetown University (retired)
Sarah Brooks, ISHR
Hanna Burdorf, Newcastle University (PhD candidate)
Kevin Carrico, Monash University
Jeff Chang, CSU
Titus C. Chen, National Sun Yat-sen University, Taiwan
Yu-Jie Chen, Institutum Iurisprudentiae, Academia Sinica, Taiwan
Alvin Y.H. Cheung, McGill University
Donald C. Clarke, George Washington University Law School
Tom Cliff, The Australian National University
Jerome Cohen, US-Asia Law Institute, NYU School of Law
Alison Conner, University of Hawaii School of Law
Håkon Dahle, University of Oslo
Angeli Datt, Freedom House
Michael Davis, Woodrow Wilson International Center
Sara (Meg) Davis, Senior researcher, Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva
Ken Endo, Hokkaido University
Nagai Eriko, Aletheia University
Cynthia Estlund, New York University School of Law
Diane Fener, Lawyer – New York, USA
James V. Feinerman, Georgetown University Law Center
Joanne Smith Finley, Newcastle University, UK
Martin Flaherty, Princeton University
Eric Florence, Associate Professor, the University of Liege
Jocelyn Ford, Independent Filmmaker
Corinna-Barbara Francis, Human Rights Consultant
Vanessa Frangville, ULB
Andreas Fulda, University of Nottingham
Mary Gallagher, University of Michigan
Jörn-Carsten Gottwald, Ruhr-University Bochum
Fabre Guilhem, University Paul Valéry-Montpellier3
Terence Halliday, American Bar Foundation
Sally han, Independent scholar
Colin Hawes, University of Technology Sydney
Sharon Hom, Adjunct Professor of Law, New York University; Human Rights in China
Robert Hornick, University of Arizona, James E. Rogers College of Law
Ping Hu, chief-editor of Beijing Spring, New York, USA
Mab Huang, Soochow University, Taipei, Taiwan
Jean-François Huchet, Inalco
Tomoaki ISHII, Professor, Meiji University
N. Jayaram, Journalist
Caleb Johnston, Newcastle University
Sumire Kanda, Aichi Prefectural University
Julu Katticaran, Yale Law School
Alyssa King, Queen’s University Faculty of Law
Katrin Kinzelbach, FAU Erlangen-Nürnberg
Sarah Kirchberger, Institute for Security Policy at Kiel University (ISPK)
David S. Law, Faculty of Law, The University of Hong Kong
李大伟 Da-Wei Li, 法律人, 中国维权人士Chinese legal advocate
Stephen O.T. Laudig, attorney
Fu-Te Liao, Institute of Law, Academia Sinica, Taiwan
Astrid Lipinsky, University of Vienna
Ariel Ling-chun Liu, Part-time lecturer, Sagami Women’s University, Japan
Shihui Liu, Disbarred Chinese lawyer
Lu Jun, Beijing Yirenping Center
Miaoqing Lu, Chinese Lawyer and Human Rights Activist
Lu Xu, Legal profession
Elizabeth M. Lynch, China Law & Policy
Nicola Macbean, The Rights Practice
Matsumoto Masumi, Professor, Muroran Institute of Technology
Barrett L. McCormick, Marquette University
Paul Mooney, Freelance Journalist
Lawrence Moss, Lawyer, New York
Christoph Müller -Hofstede, ECIT foundation
Andrew J. Nathan, Columbia University
William Nee, CHRD
Yoshiyuki OGASAWARA, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies
Natsuko Oka, Institute of Developing Economies
Karen J. Orlin, Lawyer, New York and Florida, USA
Carole J. Petersen, University of Hawaii at Manoa
Eva Pils, King’s College London
William Quigley, Emeritus Professor of Law, Loyola University New Orleans
Sophie Richardson, China Director, Human Rights Watch
Allan Roth, Professor emeritus, Rutgers University
Watanabe Rumi, Officer, working for Cabinet Office
Stuart Russell, Macquarie University School of Law, Sydney Australia (retired)
Dominique Schirmer, University of Freiburg
James D. Seymour, Independent scholar
Mark Sidel, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Roy L. Sturgeon, Tulane University Law School
Yen-tu Su, Institutum Iurisprudentiae, Academia Sinica
Hiroyuki TAMURA, Himeji Dokkyo Univ.
Max Roger Taylor, University of Dundee
Sabine Trebinjac, CNRS, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
Lung-Kuan Wang, Lawyer
魏千峯 Chien-feng Wei, 律師 Lawyer, Taiwan
Ralph Weber, University of Basel
Elisabeth Wickeri, Fordham Law School
Martin Witte, UC Berkeley
Andréa Worden, Johns Hopkins University
Dr. Qiang Wu, Beijing-based independent scholar
Feng Yuan, Women’s Rights Worker, China
Ying-yue Yung, Professor emeritus, Asia University
Jingtong Zhang, Academic
Jinhua Zhong, Human rights lawyer & Former senior Judge