China’s most prominent political prisoner, Liu Xiaobo, has died at the age of 61 following a battle with advanced liver cancer.
After Nobel Peace Prize laureate Xiaobo was diagnosed in May, his supporters and foreign governments fought to have him treated abroad, but Chinese authorities refused. They insisted s insisted he was receiving the best care possible for a disease that had spread throughout his body.
Liu was imprisoned for the first time following the 1989 Tiananmen Square pro-democracy protests and was still in prison when he died Thursday.
He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2010 while serving his fourth and final prison sentence, for inciting subversion by advocating sweeping political reforms and greater human rights in China.
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