BREAKING NEWS

Lawyer: Brother of blind Chinese activist goes missing

BEIJING - The brother of blind activist Chen Guangcheng has gone missing, a lawyer said on Saturday, days after he fled his village in northeastern China to seek help for his son who has been detained in a case that has become a rallying point among rights activists.
Chen Guangfu, the eldest brother of Chen Guangcheng, fled his home in Shandong province and arrived in Beijing on Wednesday to seek legal help for his son, Chen Kegui, who is being held on an attempted murder charge.
He appears to have become the latest target of the government's reprisals against Chen Guangcheng's family in the wake of the blind activist's escape from his village in late April after 19 months of detention at home.
Chen Guangcheng took refuge in the US embassy, where he stayed for six days and sparked a diplomatic crisis between China and the United States. That crisis, which overshadowed a visit by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, was finally defused last Saturday when China allowed Chen to fly to the United States to study.