Hollywood actor Christian Bale was roughed up by Chinese security guards as he attempted to visit a blind legal activist whose detention has sparked a domestic and international outcry, CNN reported on Friday.
Bale, who plays crime-fighting superhero Batman, and a camera crew from CNN were jostled by men in plainclothes in Dongshigu village in eastern Shandong province, where activist Chen Guangcheng has been under house arrest for 15 months, according to a video released by CNN on its website.
“Why can I not visit this man?” Bale asked several security officers, while they were pushing him.
“You know, I’m not being brave doing this,” Bale told CNN. “The local people who are standing up to the authorities and insisting on going to visit Chen and his family and getting beaten up for it, and my understanding, getting detained for it and everything. I want to support what they are doing.”
CNN said the guards shadowed its van for more than half-an-hour.
The fate of Chen, a self-schooled advocate who has campaigned against forced abortions, has become a test of wills, pitting the Communist Party’s crackdown on dissent against activists championing his cause and that of artist Ai Weiwei. — Reuters