Chen Ziming

Chen Ziming (; January 8, 1952 – October 21, 2014), pen name Wang Sirui , was a Chinese dissident and columnist for Deutsche Welle. He was born in Shanghai and grew up in Beijing. He actively participated in Chinese democratic movements in the 1970s and 1980s. He was arrested and imprisoned. After his release, he was placed under residential surveillance in Beijing. He died of pancreatic cancer in Beijing in 2014.

Life

Early life Chen was born in Shanghai on January 8, 1952. After graduating from Beijing No. 8 Middle School in 1968, he went to Abaga Banner in Inner Mongolia to join the team for six years. In 1974, he studied at Beijing Institute of Chemical Technology as a worker-peasant-soldier student.

After the Cultural Revolution In 1978, he resumed his student status and participated in the Xidan Democracy Wall Movement in Beijing. In 1979, he served as editor of Beijing Spring magazine. In 1980, he was admitted to the Graduate School of the University of Science and Technology of China and studied molecular biology at the Institute of Biophysics. He also served as the chairman of the graduate student union of the graduate school.

After being released On October 10, 2002, he was released after serving his sentence, but was still under police surveillance.

In the early morning of December 20, 2013, his friend Wang Dan revealed on Facebook that Chen Ziming was suffering from advanced cancer and had been hospitalized. He also faced the prospect of surgery, chemotherapy, etc.

In early 2014, the Chinese authorities allowed Chen Ziming to travel to the United States for medical treatment. On the evening of January 18 of the same year, Chen Ziming and his wife Wang Zhihong arrived in Boston, United States, for medical treatment. At 2:50 pm on October 21, 2014, he died of pancreatic cancer in Beijing at the age of 62.