China responded furiously yesterday after the country's most famous dissident, the imprisoned pro-democracy campaigner Liu Xiaobo, won the Nobel Peace Prize in recognition of his long and non-violent struggle for human rights.
China described the award to Mr Liu as "an insult". Mr Liu is serving 11 years in prison for subversion, but the decision cast a spotlight on the country's human rights record, with US President Barack Obama, (who gives a fuck what he says!), leading calls for Mr Liu's immediate release.
I had a business acquaintance, a person of Chinese extraction, who is now a successful businessman in Edinburgh, who I got to know really well, well as well as you can know a Chinese person in the lead up to 1990, when we ceased to meet through no fault of his.
Now in 1989, he was quite motivated by the Tian'anmen Square protest and anyway, although I know fuck all about it, if it was good enough for him, that'll do for me too!
