[JURIST] An international group of human rights lawyers on Tuesday petitioned [text, PDF; press release, PDF] the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention [official website] to condemn to the detention of Chinese human rights lawyer Gao Zhisheng [advocacy website; JURIST news archive], missing for more than a year. The group is seeking a declaration that Gao's detention is a violation of international law. According to the petition, Gao's detention violates both the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) [texts]:

Mr. Gao's current predicament is merely the culmination of a pattern and practice by which the Chinese government has consistently and clearly violated Article 19 of both the Universal Declaration and the ICCPR. Without an arrest warrant to attest otherwise, we can only assume that Mr. Gao's current detention is related to his outspoken criticism of the Chinese government's human rights record relating to religious freedom. Detaining Mr. Gao as punishment for or to prevent his defense of persecuted religious groups is a violation of Article 19(2).