fair-trial standards in the pr china

The NYTimes reports on the efforts of human rights defenders in China to shed some light on the construction of buildings that collapsed in the quake in May 2008. Discussing the fate of advocate Huang Qi, the Times states: “People charged with “illegal possession of state secrets” have little hope of defending themselves in the court system, which operates under Communist Party control. The official definition of secrets is broad and flexible, and can be applied to widely available government documents or even reports published by state-run media. The exact secret involved is rarely revealed.”