Li Wenming is a former labor-rights activist from Hunan Province who was imprisoned in China from 1994 to 1997 for attempting to organize independent support for migrant workers in Shenzhen.
Labor organizing in Shenzhen
Amnesty International reported that Li, then in his late twenties, had worked in journalism and ran the public-relations department of the Bao’an reporters’ station of Shenzhen Youth. In the early 1990s he and Guo Baosheng promoted labor-rights education among migrant workers, helped establish worker-support organizations, wrote for a bulletin called Workers’ Forum, and tried to register labor-education and legal-aid initiatives.
Detention, trial and sentence
Li was taken into police custody on May 12, 1994. Amnesty reported that he was held for about four months without charge under “shelter and investigation,” formally charged on September 29, 1994, and tried in Shenzhen from November 8 to 18, 1996. On May 30, 1997, the Shenzhen Intermediate People’s Court sentenced him to three years and six months in prison plus two years’ deprivation of political rights.
Health concerns
Amnesty and the International Labour Organization reported serious kidney problems during detention, including nephritis, dropsy and later acute kidney damage. Those health details were based partly on unofficial information available to the organizations at the time.
Release and present status
Amnesty reported that Li was due for release on November 11, 1997 and later recorded that he and Guo Baosheng were released when their sentences expired in late 1997. No reliable post-1997 information about Li’s life or location was found. He should therefore be treated as a former political prisoner, not a current detainee.
Evidence limits
No verified Chinese-character form of Li’s name was located and none is published here. Sources differ on some details concerning co-defendant Guo Baosheng, but those discrepancies do not affect Li Wenming’s identity or sentence. This record is not the same person as a Falun Gong practitioner named Li Wenming who died in 2002.
Media and Document Archive: Li Wenming — Media and Document Archive.