http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/ai-wei-wei/?utm_campaign=homepage&utm_medium=top5&utm_source=top5
One of China's most famous contemporary artists remained missing Monday, more than a day after he was blocked from leaving the country and police raided his home, his wife said.
The disappearance of artist Ai Weiwei comes as China carries out a massive crackdown on lawyers, writers and activists, arresting and detaining dozens since online calls for protests similar to those in the Middle East and North Africa began to circulate in February. No public protests have emerged.
Ai, an outspoken government critic, has been keeping an informal tally of those detentions on Twitter, where he has been an avid poster, frequently expressing outrage at injustice and drawing more than 70,000 followers. Ai, a star in international art circles, has been barred from going abroad before at least once before and was stopped while preparing to board a flight to Hong Kong on Sunday. Police later raided his Beijing home and studio.
"There is no news of him so far," said Ai's wife, Lu Qing. Lu said she was interrogated Sunday night by Beijing city police, who searched the couple's home and took away items, including documents, computers and hard drives.
"They asked me about Ai Weiwei's work and the articles he posted online," Lu told The Associated Press. "I told them that everything that Ai did was very public, and if they wanted to know his opinions and work they could just look at the Internet."
She said a group of office employees who were detained when Ai's studio was searched had been released.
Lu said police gave no hints as to where Ai was, why he was being detained or how long he would be held. She said Ai's mother, who is in her 80s, was very anxious about her son's fate.
A question faxed to police Monday asking about Ai's situation was not immediately answered. Under Chinese law, police are supposed to notify family members when detaining a suspect for longer than 24 hours, though authorities often ignore such strictures, especially in politically high-profile cases, as Ai's certainly would be.
Ai is the son of one of China's most famous modern poets, and that stature led many to believe he was protected from serious attack or formal arrest. He had been courted by the communist government as a cultural ambassador before his advocacy on behalf of social activists apparently made him a target of Chinese authorities.
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/04/04/ai-weiwei-missing-china_n_844386.html
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