Huang Qi

Creator of China’s first human rights news website in 1998 and winner of the Reporters Without Borders Cyber-Freedom Prize in 2004, Huang Qi has spent eight of the past 14 years in prison. He was jailed in 2000 for “inciting subversion” and again in 2008 on a charge of “ possessing state secrets”, for gathering information to help parents of the victims of the Sichuan earthquake. With the help of thousands of volunteers, his 64tianwang.comwebsite has done extraordinary work over the past 16 years, publishing information about tens of thousands of human rights violations and helping to win at least 10 billion yuan (more than a billion euros) in compensation for victims throughout China. Seven of the site’s contributors are currently detained and Huang himself is the target of a new investigation orchestrated by the Beijing public security department. But, despite close surveillance, he continues to work tirelessly to bring justice to his compatriots.