Nobel Peace Prize for Liu Xiaobo

In a brave gesture sure to evoke the ire of Beijing’s octogenarian autocrats, the Nobel Prize for Peace has been awarded to the Chinese literary critic and essayist Liu Xiaobo. Liu has been in prison in China since 2008, charged and convicted of “subversion against the state” on account of his stirring advocacy of democracy and human rights, best embodied in Charter ‘08. He has emerged as the de facto leader of the Chartist Movement in China. Read my discussion with Liu’s friend and fellow Chartist Sha Yexin, in which we discuss Liu’s plight, here.