Chinese citizens ending up in secret detentions. "Black jails".

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Some Chinese seeking help from the central government against local injustices are instead ending up in secret detention centres controlled by local politicians.
The politicians are believed to arrange for petitioners to be abducted before they reach Beijing to complain, fearing central government investigations that could hurt their reputations.
The central government denies the existence of such "black jails", as Melissa Chan reports.
China "black jails" prompt fears of wider security crackdown 

 (Reuters) - China's campaign to stifle dissenters like artist Ai Weiwei through secret detentions could come cloaked in a thicker veneer of legality if proposed crime law changes go through, a prominent rights advocacy group said on Thursday. China has clamped down hard on dozens of prominent critics and dissidents including human rights lawyers, bloggers and civil activists by locking them up incommunicado for weeks and even months at a time in undisclosed locations. China's moves to amend criminal laws next year to effectively legitimize extra-judicial detentions of people for up to six months could see a hardening of the nation's security crackdown in the run-up to a change in leadership, Human Rights Watch said. "The government move to legalize practices which it has otherwise indicated it should eradicate we find highly, highly problematic," Sophie Richardson, China director of Human Rights Watch, told reporters.
 "We believe this is indicative of a much larger scope that's being given to the domestic security authorities that will in the future be extremely difficult to rein in." China's Foreign Ministry said "the competent authorities of China have been soliciting the public's views" on the proposed amendment.
 "We are willing to listen to their views but some organizations have been viewing China with colored lenses," ministry spokesman Hong Lei told reporters. "For such organizations, we will not comment on their behavior." Despite international criticism, China has continued to run so-called "black jails" -- unlawful secret detention facilities used to hold critics and petitioners, where detainees are often subjected to beatings, sleep and food deprivation, as well as psychological abuse. With President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao due to step aside for a new generation of leaders next year, the jockeying for power will likely see few liberal gestures, given the obsessive focus on preserving stability.
 "There are very few people, particularly at senior levels of the government, that are in a mood to experiment or take risks or propose innovative new strategies for responding to dissent in a systematic way," said Richardson. Despite this, Human Rights Watch said civil rights activism was proliferating quickly as individuals, empowered by the Internet and wildly popular micro-blogging sites, were increasingly emboldened to push back to assert their rights.
 She cited the case of blind activist lawyer Chen Guangcheng, beaten by thugs whilst under house arrest in northeastern Shandong province, and Ai Weiwei, who have become rallying points amongst regular Chinese citizens railing against human rights abuses. "In the long run, it will be very difficult for the Chinese government to put that genie back in the bottle," she said. Ai said this week he was agonizing over whether to pay a 15 million yuan ($2.4 million) bill for alleged tax evasion and tacitly admit guilt, or to fight the charge and possibly risk detention again. Supporters of Ai, whose 81-day secret detention earlier this year sparked an international outcry, have said the tax case is part of Beijing's efforts to muzzle dissent.

MEXICO - Drug cartel attacks fourth victim found beheaded with threatening message.

Nov. 10 - Mexican social media boom draws drug cartel attacks, as fourth victim is found dead with threatening message. Nick Rowlands reports. Another blogger has been decapitated, purportedly in retaliation for postings about drug cartels, prompting users of social network sites to unite in their stance against the gangs.
 The gruesome slaying on Wednesday is believed to be the fourth since early September in which a drug cartel killed people in Nuevo Laredo for what they said online.
 "I'm Rascatripas and this happened to me for failing to understand that I should not report things on social media websites. I am a ..... (text covered by body) just like La Nena from Laredo... With this last report I bid farewell to Nuevo Laredo en Vivo.. Always remem... Never For... Your moderator, RASCATRIPAS," said a placard left with the man's body at a busy intersection in Nuevo Laredo, according to Borderland Beat. The body was found at the city's Christopher Columbus monument, the site reported. Nuevo Laredo, across the border from Laredo, Texas, has been dominated for about the last two years by the violent Los Zetas drug cartel.

 The victim was described as 35 and identified on social networking sites by the nickname El Rascatripas or "belly scratcher." The victim reportedly posted updates on the Zetas' activities and had collaborated with slain journalist Mary Elizabeth Macias, 39, who was butchered in the same manner and dumped in the same spot, El Universal.com reported. Bloggers and users of online chatrooms reacted with shock.

MEXICO CITY - Gangsters killed and beheaded an Internet blogger Wednesday in Nuevo Laredo, the fourth slaying in the city involving people associated with social media sites since early September.

"This happened to me for not understanding that I shouldn't report on the social networks," advised a note left before dawn with the man's body at a key intersection in the city's wealthier neighborhood.

The victim, identified on social networking sites only by his nickname - Rascatripas or Belly Scratcher - reportedly helped moderate a site called En Vivo that posted news of shootouts and other activities of the Zetas, the narcotics and extortion gang that all but controls the city.

The beheaded body of another blogger, 39-year-old Elizabeth Macias, who contributed to the blog, was found in the same location in late September.

A young man and a woman were hung from a highway overpass earlier that same month. A sign left with their bodies said they too had been killed for their social media activity.

Police investigators refused to provide details of Wednesday's killing, citing security concerns.

Newspaper scales back

Social networks buzzed with the news. Some Twitter and blog posts encouraged others to press on against the criminals despite the dangers.

"No matter, I have to die of something," said one post. "It will be for my people."

With mainstream newspapers and broadcasters terrorized by the criminal gangs, whose violence has killed upward of 50,000 people across Mexico in five years, social media networks have become key information sources in many towns and cities.

A senior editor at El Mañana, Nuevo Laredo's largest newspaper, was knifed to death after leaving work in 2004. Gunmen attacked the newspaper's offices in 2006, crippling a journalist. The newspaper since has dramatically scaled back its reporting of the violence, as have other news organizations.

Anonymous steps in

Two weeks ago, a man representing himself as a member of Anonymous, the Internet hacker organization, posted a video on YouTube claiming that the Zetas had kidnapped one of the group. He demanded that the Zetas return the victim unharmed or Anonymous would publish identities of Zetas members and their protectors in government and business.

A few days later, the group said they were dropping the threat because of the danger it posed to innocent lives. A debate raged in Mexico and elsewhere over whether the kidnapping and subsequent threat to the gangsters was real or a hoax.

"Don't speak on cellphones when walking in the street, especially when (gangster) convoys pass by," warned an anonymous poster on the Nuevo Laredo En Vivo site Wednesday. "These ZZZZ's think you're talking to the army and will pick you up. Be careful."

Police arrested two people in southern Veracruz state in September for posting rumors on Twitter about impending gangster attacks on schools that caused several traffic accidents as panicked parents rushed to their children's aid.

Veracruz's governor introduced a bill that would have outlawed such postings for "disturbing the public tranquility." The bill was later dropped and the Twitter users released.

A Wednesday posting on Nuevo Laredo En Vivo after the blogger's death declared, "Let's continue denouncing them, now that we've seen it burns them, hurts them .... We have to continue. We can't give in."