This English version may have been machine-generated from the Chinese original and may not convey the original meaning accurately.
Two and a half years after serving his full seven-year prison sentence, Pastor Cao Sanqiang of a house church in Hunan remains on the “prohibited from leaving the country” list. He was recently diagnosed with advanced prostate cancer. With limited mobility and overwhelming medical expenses, he is nevertheless unable to obtain a passport and cannot travel to the United States to reunite with his wife, son, and grandchildren. Even more troubling, the relevant authorities have neither explained the specific grounds for restricting his exit nor informed him of the duration of the restriction, responding only, “You know very well what it’s about.” The above was reported by Radio Free Asia; some details still await further clarification from the relevant parties.
This is no longer merely a question of whether a patient may leave the country, but of whether a citizen can know why he is being restricted, defend himself, and obtain effective remedy. Cao Sanqiang previously served a prison sentence for “organizing others to illegally cross the national border.” The United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention previously determined that his detention was arbitrary and related to his Christian faith. The completion of a prison term means that the punishment lawfully imposed by the state has, in principle, ended. If the authorities still wish to restrict his freedom of movement, they should have a clear legal basis, specific facts, an open procedure, and a time limit subject to review, rather than making a person repeatedly “go try the machine” and wait for the system to decide his fate.
The report also shows that he must report when traveling to other cities and is followed by personnel. This continuing surveillance, lacking transparent boundaries, transforms a time-limited judicial sentence into administrative control with no deadline and no explanation. More importantly, we should ask: when those in power need not explain their reasons and the person concerned cannot challenge the decision through an independent judiciary, what remains of so-called “governance according to law”?
The common affliction underlying such cases is not the attitude of any particular staff member, but the lack of effective constraints on power. Under one-party rule, the administrative authorities, public security system, and judicial system struggle to form genuinely independent oversight relationships. Without democratic elections, citizens lack channels to hold those in power accountable through political processes. Without freedom of the press and expression, individual cases also struggle to receive timely and sufficient public scrutiny. In the end, passports, border controls, surveillance, and even medical circumstances may all become tools through which power arbitrarily controls individual dignity.
Cao Sanqiang is not asking for a privilege, but for the basic humanitarian wish of a patient to reunite with his family and be accompanied by loved ones during the final stage of his life. A system that genuinely respects human beings should be grounded in constitutional democracy, the separation of powers, judicial independence, and the protection of basic human rights, ensuring that every decision restricting freedom can withstand legal and public scrutiny. We should remember: citizens are not objects waiting for favors, and dignity should not depend on whether a particular system grants passage.
News background: The original report on which this commentary is based can be found at Radio Free Asia Mandarin。