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Chinese County Orders Lawyers To Get Government Approval Before Defending Criminal Charges
Authored by Michael Zhuang via The Epoch Times,
A county justice bureau in southwestern China has ordered local law firms to report cases related to the government's "anti-organized crime" campaign and obtain official approval before lawyers can argue that a defendant's alleged offense should be classified differently.
The No. 2 Intermediate People's Court in the Beijing suburb of Fangzhuang on Aug. 15, 2006. Goh Chai Hin/AFP via Getty ImagesThe notice, issued directly to law firms by the Justice Bureau of Pu'an County in Guizhou Province, requires lawyers handling cases covered by a recent anti-organized crime public notice to report them to the bureau's public legal services department, according to a Sept. 18 blog post by a legal blogger on Chinese news portal NetEase.
The requirement has prompted concerns among Chinese lawyers that a government administrative agency is attempting to exercise control over how defense lawyers present their cases in court.
The notice states that law firms handling cases covered by the campaign "must promptly report [them] to the county justice bureau's public legal services department."
It adds: "If the defense argument is to change the legal characterization of the crime, it must be reported to the county justice bureau for study and approval before that defense theory can be expressed. All law firms are requested to strictly implement this."
Under the arrangement, lawyers would therefore need to do more than simply notify the justice bureau that they are handling a particular case. Before presenting a defense argument that challenges the prosecution's characterization of an alleged offense, they would have to obtain approval from the same government agency responsible for regulating the local legal profession.
Lawyers Question RestrictionsTwo China-based attorneys spoke to The Epoch Times on condition of anonymity, giving only their surnames out of fear of reprisal.
Zhang, a human rights lawyer from Hubei Province, said the local county requirement violates China's Criminal Procedure Law and interferes with defendants' rights to a defense, as well as lawyers' independent practice.
"Lawyers [should act] independently in accordance with the law and not be subject to unlawful interference by any administrative agency," Zhang said. "Establishing administrative approval or consent as a prerequisite for using a defense argument is tantamount to placing the review of judicial administrative agencies above the law."
China's Criminal Procedure Law provides that defense lawyers should, based on facts and law, present materials and opinions concerning innocence, lesser offenses, or the reduction or exemption of criminal responsibility.
However, the Pu'an County notice requires lawyers to wait for the justice bureau to "study and approve" one category of such defense arguments before presenting it.
Liu, a Beijing-based human rights lawyer, told The Epoch Times that the requirement is particularly significant in cases arising from government-led anti-organized crime campaigns, in which lawyers may need to challenge the evidence or the prosecution's classification of an alleged offense.
"In mainland China, the more anti-organized crime is designated by the authorities as a task, the more lawyers need to question the evidence and the characterization of the crime," Liu said.
If administrative agencies can screen out defense arguments they do not approve of, he said, a trial could effectively be left with only the prosecution's account, reducing the defense to a mere formality.
"Special campaigns such as the 'anti-organized crime' campaign launched by the Chinese Communist Party ... carry clear political-task implications for local officials," Liu said. "This precisely reflects that the [local] authorities concerned are moving toward abandoning judicial fairness, and doing so will lead to more wrongful and unjust cases."
Similar Rule Previously WithdrawnThe requirement in Pu'an has a precedent elsewhere in Guizhou Province.
According to a 2015 report by Chinese state-owned media outlet The Paper, the Zunyi Municipal Justice Bureau introduced a rule in late 2014 requiring lawyers to report cases in which they intended to argue for a defendant's acquittal or seek a change in the criminal charge.
Lawyers filed a government information disclosure request concerning the rule. The justice bureau responded that because the provision was controversial, it had decided to withdraw it.
The earlier rule required lawyers to report such cases. The Pu'an notice goes further by explicitly stating that a lawyer seeking to change the legal characterization of a crime must obtain the county justice bureau's "study and approval" before expressing the defense argument in court.
Ye Zilong contributed to this report.
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Seattle Mayor Calls For New Gun Laws While Letting Repeat Offenders Roam Free
It's the communist playbook in real time. Allow crime to fester, then disarm law abiding citizens rather than punishing the people responsible.
Democratic Socialist Mayor of Seattle, Katie Wilson, has been a disaster for the city and she's only been in office nine months. So far, multiple major corporate employers are leaving Seattle to avoid tax expansion, homeless camps are growing exponentially, she has triggered several public safety controversies, faced potential recall and plunging public approval.
Anyone with sense could have predicted this, but Seattle is a nesting ground for woke cultism and Wilson said all the right things during her campaign.
As with any far-left administration, it was only a matter of time before Wilson went after firearms rights. In a recent announcement on a "new approach to gun violence", the Mayor calls for "preventing gun violence before it happens". Part of this plan includes Wilson pushing for added restrictions to firearms carry in Washington.
Wilson wants to work with the state legislature to advance gun violence prevention legislation, including regulation of firearms “in sensitive spaces,” regulation of firearms at the city's center, and an update to juvenile firearm possession and sentencing laws (she does not specify what these updates would entail).
Washington already preempts most local gun regulation. Cities cannot ban carry on their own; any broader restrictions would require a change in state law. Current state rules limit guns in some city-run stadiums and convention centers, with exceptions for people who have a valid concealed pistol license.
Wilson’s proposal has not spelled out whether licensed concealed carry would be included in every “sensitive space.” But her added restrictions, as presented, would only affect legal and law abiding gun owners.
The problem with this model is that it ignores the source of the crime. The vast majority of gun violence in Seattle is committed by 0.1% of all residents, and the majority of these criminals are repeat offenders. Roughly 900 people in a city of 780,000 are connected to 52% of the violence. Why not simply lock these 900 people up for good?
On such case is Alrick Hollingsworth, who served only seven years for shooting five people are a Seattle bus stop and was released early. Hollingsworth went back out on the streets this year only to commit another shooting.
Wilson and leftists like her will never lock up repeat offenders this because it would contradict their position on "social solutions" to crime response. Many criminals who commit violence are already on law enforcement radar because they have a long rap sheet of lesser offenses. Wilson promotes a program called "LEAD Seattle" (Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion) which "diverts" offenders with "lesser crimes" away from prosecution and into social services projects.
This problem is magnified in juvenile courts where offenders consistently get a slap on the wrist and sent to the revolving door.
Whether or not the WA legislature agrees with Wilson on increased gun carry restriction is not yet clear, but the narrative is predictable. Leftist candidates have consistently lost favor with the American public when it comes to gun control and they seem to have backed away from their more aggressive rhetoric on the issue. However, that doesn't mean they are abandoning their gun grabber roots.
As we have seen in the past, gun control always starts with incrementalism - They start with less contentious restrictions, like a ban of concealed carry in public spaces, then move the ball forward from there. Why should the rest of Seattle's citizens pay the price for the actions of 900 dangerous thugs? There's no logical reason other than control. The goal is not to solve crime, the goal is to exploit crime as a vehicle to add new laws.
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China Will Dominate Global Nuclear Energy Through 2035, Analyst Says
Authored by Haley Zaremba via OilPrice.com,
The future of nuclear energy is in China's hands. While the United States remains the world's largest producer of nuclear energy, China's sector is growing at such a rapid clip that it is expected to overtake France as well as the United States to become the world's leading nuclear power producer within the next decade. In addition to this rapid expansion of traditional nuclear power capacity, Beijing has also quickly become the global leader in a broad and diverse range of advanced nuclear power technologies.
"By a wide margin, China will have the world's most dynamic and significant nuclear industry through 2035," Damien Ma, energy lead analyst for Gavekal Technologies, wrote in a recent report, as quoted by the South China Morning Post. "Construction efficiencies mean China can build a new plant in about six years, compared with more than a decade for the latest Vogtle reactors in the US," Ma went on to say.
The United States has added just one nuclear plant in the last decade, Georgia's long-delayed, over-budget, and controversial Plant Vogtle. Over the same time, China added a staggering 34 gigawatts of capacity. And, Beijing's latest five year plan shows that China has no intentions of slowing down.
"With innovation and security as its leading themes, the latest FYP illuminates how nuclear energy underpins multiple strategic priorities for China in the context of not only energy security but also technological innovation and global engagement," the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a nonprofit policy research organization and bipartisan think tank recently reported.
The Chinese government has been eager to build up the most advanced nuclear power sector in the world as a part of Beijing's broader bid to establish lasting dominance in the global energy sector by becoming the world's first electrostate. Building the world's most advanced nuclear energy fleet is a part of this goal, and includes innovative approaches to how nuclear reactors are designed, deployed, and fueled.
"From the world's first in-reactor thorium breeding confirmation to a dual PWR-HTGR plant and commercial supercritical CO2 generation, China is assembling a vertically integrated advanced nuclear ecosystem," Power Magazine reported in March of this year. "The breadth of activity signals a coordinated push toward fuel independence and industrial deployment."
The United States has also been bullish about building up and advancing its aging nuclear sector. The Trump administration has publicized its intentions to "produce lasting American dominance in the global nuclear energy market" and is likewise bullish on developing next-gen nuclear reactors and nuclear fusion technology on its own home turf. Similarly to China, the United States is also fighting to free itself from international nuclear fuel supply chains, and is attempting to do so by building up domestic uranium extraction and enrichment capacities. But the United States' advanced nuclear sector is lagging far behind China when it comes to spending and technological knowhow.
But while China is historically quite secretive about its technological advancements and cutting-edge energy sector developments, this week Beijing made a surprising move to share its expertise with the rest of the world. This week, China signed a deal with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to more freely share its knowledge on high-temperature gas-cooled reactors (HTGRs) with other countries. HGTRs are a form of advanced fourth-generation reactor that is capable of producing nuclear energy at extremely high temperatures, opening avenues for use in a variety of industrial applications.
The new deal "covers cooperation in HTGR research and development, reactor design, construction, commissioning and operation," as well as the exchange of "information on supply chains and personnel training," according to a recent Interesting Engineering report. "The deal could give other countries greater access to China's engineering experience with HTGRs as interest grows in nuclear systems that can provide both electricity and high-temperature industrial heat."
This development is a promising starting point for a more cooperative approach to what is indeed a borderless problem - climate change and the growing problem of artificial intelligence's energy demand growth. Advanced nuclear energy systems could provide a critical lifeline by offering clean energy 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Tyler Durden Mon, 09/21/2026 - 20:55