Xiaobo, Payá, King and Gandhi: Concluding a Season of Nonviolence
"I say nonviolent struggle is armed struggle. And we have to take back that term from those advocates of violence who seek to justify with pretty words that kind of combat." -Gene Sharp
We have extended the Season of Non-violence that begins on January 30th, the death anniversary of Mohandas Gandhi that normally concludes on April 4th, the death anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr. It has been extended to include the death anniversaries of Liu Xiaobo, July 13, 2017 and Oswaldo Payá, July 22, 2012.
Both Liu Xiaobo and Oswaldo Paya were not only influenced by Gandhian-Kingian nonviolence, but also by Vaclav Havel, and Charter 77. These two dissidents were both recognized by the Czech dissident, who oversaw the transition to democracy in his homeland beginning in 1989, and was elected its president.
Charter 77 was named after a document published on January 6, 1977, which served as the foundation for an informal civic initiative. It criticized the Czechoslovak government for failing to implement human rights provisions outlined in several international agreements to which Czechoslovakia was a signatory.
In 2002, Czech President Vaclav Havel nominated Oswaldo Payá for the Nobel Peace Prize.
Thanks to leverage by the Spanish government the Cuban opposition leader was able to travel outside of Cuba and meet with heads of state, and receive the European Union’s Andrei Sakharov Prize. Among the European capitals he visited was Prague, where he met Vaclav Havel in person for the first, and last time. However through letters, and video chats they were able to communicate throughout the years.
On December 17, 2002 Oswaldo Payá addressed the European Parliament in Strasbourg and offered a message centered in human rights, national reconciliation, and democracy.
“I have not come here to ask you to support those who oppose the Cuban Government or to condemn those who persecute us. It is of no help to Cuba that some people in the world side with the country’s government or with the latter’s opponents on the basis of an ideological standpoint. We want others to side with the Cuban people - with all Cubans – and this means upholding all their rights, supporting openness, supporting our demand that our people should be consulted via the ballot box regarding the changes we are calling for. We are asking for solidarity so that our people can be given an opportunity to speak through the ballot box, as proposed in the Varela Project.”
Havel continued to follow the unfolding events in Cuba, and on November 17, 2003 in a letter to the Cuban dissident made the following observations.
“The Varela Project that you embody takes its inspiration from our Charter 77 movement. Even though the Varela Project originally involved only a small number of oppositionists, it has recently gained in power. I was delighted to hear that a few weeks ago you handed over fourteen thousand more signatures on your petition calling on the regime to observe the civil rights granted by the Cuban Constitution. This is a remarkable accomplishment. It is well known that a totalitarian regime characteristically has nothing but disrespect for law. Insisting that it adhere to the legal standards it has itself adopted can drive a totalitarian government mad.”
There was not direct communication between Vaclav Havel and Liu Xiaobo, but the Czech president did campaign for his release from prison, and to obtain greater international recognition.
The nonviolent dissident, scholar and prisoner of conscience Liu Xiaobo was arrested on June 23, 2009 and charged with “inciting subversion of state power” for co-authoring Charter 08, a declaration calling for political reform, greater human rights, and an end to one-party rule in China.
The speech he delivered at his trial on December 23, 2009 is one that remains extremely relevant today. In a key passage of his final statement Liu Xiaobo said the following:
“But I still want to say to this regime, which is depriving me of my freedom, that I stand by the convictions I expressed in my "June Second Hunger Strike Declaration" twenty years ago ‑ I have no enemies and no hatred. None of the police who monitored, arrested, and interrogated me, none of the prosecutors who indicted me, and none of the judges who judged me are my enemies. Although there is no way I can accept your monitoring, arrests, indictments, and verdicts, I respect your professions and your integrity, including those of the two prosecutors, Zhang Rongge and Pan Xueqing, who are now bringing charges against me on behalf of the prosecution. During interrogation on December 3, I could sense your respect and your good faith.
Hatred can rot away at a person's intelligence and conscience. Enemy mentality will poison the spirit of a nation, incite cruel mortal struggles, destroy a society's tolerance and humanity, and hinder a nation's progress toward freedom and democracy. That is why I hope to be able to transcend my personal experiences as I look upon our nation's development and social change, to counter the regime's hostility with utmost goodwill, and to dispel hatred with love.”
This refusal to hate or to recognize an adversary as an enemy, combined with firmness and courage to reject and defy the injustices committed against him is a continuation of the non-violent approach of Mohandas Gandhi, and Martin Luther King Jr.
Still imprisoned from the June 2009 arrest he was sentenced to 11 years in prison on December 25, 2009 following the political show trial carried out by Beijing.
On December 26, 2009, Oswaldo called for the release of Liu Xiaobo, who had been sentenced to 11 years in prison for “inciting subversion of state power” for publishing essays critical of the Chinese Communist Party on the Internet and for being one of the authors of Charter 08, a political manifesto calling for democratic reforms, made public in December 2008. He also welcomed the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize being awarded to the Chinese dissident leader. Unfortunately, the two were never able to establish a more direct and personal relationship.
Nor was the Chinese dissident able to have direct communication with Vaclav Havel due to his imprisonment. However, Havel did campaign for his release, and nominated Liu Xiaobo for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2010.
Liu Xiaobo was told by prison authorities on October 9, 2010 that he had won the Nobel Peace Prize. When his wife Liu Xia visited him in prison the prisoner of conscience told her: “This is for the lost souls of June 4th.” Dedicating the prize to the demonstrators killed in Tiananmen Square on June 4, 1989. Liu Xia was placed under house arrest after returning home from visiting her jailed husband Liu Xiaobo, and communications and visitors curtailed. Activists that wanted to gather and celebrate Liu Xiaobo’s award were also detained.
Oswaldo Payá sent a video-contribution to the Forum 2000 Conference "Democracy and the Rule of Law" held in Prague from October 9--11, 2011. He began by lamenting that the dictatorship had not allowed him to leave Cuba, and that there is no right to free travel. The political activist and founding member of the Christian Liberation Movement offered a non-violent vision for change in Cuba.
“We Cubans seek freedom, changes towards democracy, reconciliation and the full exercise of human rights, but we know that the true path to these goals is a peaceful one and between Cubans. This is how it is defined in the Varela Project and also in the roadmap titled The Path of the People and affirmed by a large number of dissident organisations both within and outside Cuba together with many of its citizens.
Democracy is only real when it facilitates the restoration of justice. Democracy, apart from representing the power of the majority, must also be an instrument for guaranteeing the rights of each individual; it must establish and protect the dignity of every human being, it must ensure the sovereign power of the people and serve as an instrument for channeling love between them. The rule of law must therefore be based on humanism from which all ethical principles are derived.”
Ten days prior to his passing on December 18, 2011 Havel signed on as one of the members of a new International Committee to Support Liu Xiaobo.
Following Havel’s death, Oswaldo Payá wrote, “Havel, precursor and guide to liberation in this new era. God receive you, friend in solidarity with the cause of democracy in Cuba. Personally I lose an inspiring friend, from whom I received a great education. Always grateful to Havel for the reception he gave me.”
Months later Oswaldo Payá and Harold Cepero were killed after a car crash provoked by Cuban state agents on July 22, 2012. Polish solidarity leader and former President of Poland in a July 23, 2012 letter to the Christian Liberation Movement.
“Oswaldo Paya will remain in my memory as a man of courage, determination and extraordinary fighting spirit. He was one of the most important voices of freedom in Cuba - and therefore incessantly spoke of the need to initiate political and economic reforms and to recognize the general human rights of every person. Oswaldo was confident that these changes may arise in a peaceful way and demanded that the entire Cuban nation participate in this process. On more than one occasion he made reference in his letters that Solidarity and Poland's history as an indicator for him. I wrote that in the difficult path towards democracy faith is very important, it is almost the certainty that the struggle that one is developing will bring success.”
Less than five years later the Chinese dissident leader died without being freed from his unjust prison sentence.
Xiaobo died of "multiple organ failure" on July 13, 2017 while still under the custody of the Chinese communists. Friends and family had expressed concern that he was not receiving proper medical care.
Chinese dissident Yang Jianli on July 17, 2017 spoke at the Victims of Communism Memorial in Washington DC, and placed Liu Xiaobo's legacy in historic context.
"Liu Xiaobo was not only the best known freedom and democracy fighter of China, but, in life as well as in death, he represents the best of what China can ever be. In April 1989, when the Tiananmen democracy movement just broke out, he returned to Beijing from New York and became the most important intellectual leader of the movement. After the Tiananmen Massacre, he shouldered both moral and political responsibilities and continued to fight from inside China while many others left the country and even abandoned the movement. He was in and out of prison and spent half of the past 28 years after the Tiananmen Massacre in incarceration. Never wavering in spirit, he shared the sufferings of his compatriots and gave his life for them. He is a martyr and saint."
Oswaldo Payá and Liu Xiaobo are no longer physically with us, but their example, writings, speeches, and interviews live on, serving as an inspiration to civic nonviolent activists, and human rights defenders everywhere. Like Mohandas Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. Vaclav Havel, and Lech Walesa they will continue to inspire new generations to demand and exercise their rights in China, Cuba, and elsewhere.
They are real world examples that nonviolent resistance is not passive. In 1990 at the National Conference on Nonviolent Sanctions and Defense in Boston, nonviolent scholar Gene Sharp succinctly outlined his argument that nonviolent struggle is also armed struggle.
"I say nonviolent struggle is armed struggle. And we have to take back that term from those advocates of violence who seek to justify with pretty words that kind of combat. Only with this type of struggle one fights with psychological weapons, social weapons, economic weapons and political weapons. And that this is ultimately more powerful against oppression, injustice and tyranny than violence."
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