Li Rui
Chinese historian and politician
Died when: 101 years 309 days (1222 months)Star Sign: Aries
Li Rui (simplified Chinese: 李锐; traditional Chinese: 李銳; pinyin: Lǐ Ruì;April 13, 1917 – February 16, 2019) was a Chinese politician, historian and dissident Chinese Communist Party member.
As a young student activist, he joined the communists in 1937 during the Chinese Civil War.By 1958, he had become the vice-minister of the Ministry of Water Resources.
His vocal opposition to the Three Gorges Dam brought him to the attention of Chairman of the Chinese Communist Party Mao Zedong.
Mao, impressed by Li, made Li his personal secretary for industrial affairs.However, Li was known for his independence of thought, and after defying Mao at the 1959 Lushan Conference, he was stripped of his party membership and sent to a prison camp, beginning nearly twenty years of political exile.
Denounced by his family for anti-Mao activities during the Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution, Li spent eight years in solitary confinement at the Qincheng Prison.
After Mao's death, Li's party membership was restored and he regained an influential position in the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
However, after only a few years, he was forced to resign due to his unwillingness to give preference to the children of influential party members.
From the mid-1980s, shut out of formal power, Li wrote and commentated extensively, calling for freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and democracy within a socialist framework.
He also wrote five books on Mao and early Communist Party history.Li remained a party member until his death, respected but isolated; his views were formally denounced and he was censored in the Chinese press.
Li died in 2019, aged 101.He was described by The Guardian as living a life "filled with rebellions, often at great personal cost, against those who abused their power."
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