BEIJING ( Chinese Activist Makes Video in Jail - human rights )

BEIJING – A prominent human rights and transparency activist jailed last month recorded and circulated a video urging his fellow Chinese to “stand up” for their beliefs.

In the roughly minute-long clip, Xu Zhiyong, handcuffed behind bars and wearing orange prison garb, urges people to unite so they can build “a China with freedom, justice and love.”

The video, which can be viewed on the Web site of the South China Morning Post or on YouTube, had to be shot by some attorney who could visit Xu, the newspaper said.

Xu is one of the founders of the Gongmen movement, which asks senior officials to disclose their assets and demands that the government respect the rights established in China’s constitution.

After spending two months under house arrest, Xu was taken into custody in mid-July on charges of trying to promote a public disturbance.

“Urging people to be citizens, and to comply with the rights and obligations of citizens, to demand equal rights in education and the reform of access to university, and to ask the authorities to be transparent about their activities: those are the three crimes I have committed in these absurd times,” Xu says in the video shot inside Detention Center No. 3 in Beijing.

As of Thursday, nearly 2,700 people had signed a petition for Xu’s release, which has also been requested by the government of the United States.

The promoter of the petition, veteran journalist Xiao Shu, was also arrested.

These detentions are added to the dozen carried out to date this year against Gongmen activists. EFE