(Posted October 13, 2003)

HUNTINGDON, Pa. ? Dimon Liu, a human rights activist in China, starts a weeklong stay as a Woodrow Wilson Visiting Fellow from Oct. 19 through Oct. 25. Liu is scheduled to speak in several classes, eat breakfast every morning with a group of students, and give a public lecture at 7:30 p.m., Thursday, Oct. 22 in Alumni Hall in the Brumbaugh Science Center at Juniata College.

The public lecture, ?Human Rights in China,? is free and open to the public.

?The Woodrow Wilson Visiting fellow speaker program offers students the opportunity to interact with a speaker for a week, giving a deeper impact than what just one speech would give,? comments James Tuten, assistant provost at Juniata and coordinator of the college?s speakers program. ?Dimon Liu?s message during her time here at Juniata will prove to be powerful, because her interest in human rights grew from her own personal history as a woman living in China.?

In 1972, Liu, who had emigrated to the U.S. as a child, became a human rights activist in China after observing the terrible conditions in China during a three-month trip. Since 1972, Liu has initiated teach-ins, set up human rights organizations, and informed journalists of the conditions in China. She was also successful in organizing an intervention at the U.N. Sub-Commission on Human Rights in 1989, which led to the U.N. to warn China about human rights abuse.

At the World Conference on Human Rights in Vienna in 1993, Liu gave a speech against the notions of ?Asian Values.? Also, in 1993, Liu joined a few friends in organizing the yearly Staunton Hill Peoples Liberation Army Conference.

Liu also spoke to the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives on the human rights conditions in China, and organized another campaign on the ?arrested scholars? in 2001. Liu was born in China, but she was educated in architecture in New York and political economy in London, and then taught architecture for fifteen years in Hong Kong and New York.

The Woodrow Wilson Visiting Fellows program was established to bring thoughtful and successful practitioners to colleges for a week of classes and informal discussions with students and faculty.

The Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation has developed and conducted programs in higher education since 1945. More than 200 colleges have participated in the Visiting Fellows program since 1973.

Contact April Feagley at feaglea@juniata.edu or (814) 641-3131 for more information.