China rounds up rights lawyers in latest crackdown

Four men already had been convicted of murder in southeastern China when a fifth person confessed to the crime. But when lawyers demanded to review case documents to clear the men's names, the court stonewalled. So the lawyers unfurled banners outside the venue.
They protested for days, alongside social activists who insulted the top judge, and uploaded pictures online.
The incident in the southeastern province of Jiangxi in May appears to have been one of the last straws ahead of a broad crackdown by China's Public Security Ministry on a category of lawyers who have come to be known as "rights defenders."

Authorities say these lawyers have strayed far beyond their professional role into illegal activism aimed at sabotaging the country's legal system. The lawyers maintain their methods are merely to hold authorities to account and ensure that the letter of China's laws is upheld.
Since late May, police across China have detained and called in at least 215 rights lawyers and social activists, most of them during the past week or so. State propaganda has kicked into high gear to denounce them as rabble-rousers, criminal gangs, profit-seeking opportunists.
Some even face the severe charge of inciting to overthrow state power.
Foreign governments and human rights groups have condemned the crackdown, seeing it as Beijing's iron-fisted response under President Xi Jinping to any growth of civil society that could challenge the Communist Party's authoritarian rule. It also shows that the rights lawyers have gained enough influence with the public to make Beijing uneasy, joining outspoken bloggers and activist movements in drawing crackdowns since Xi came to power in 2012.