What a detainee in China can say, refuse and request: interrogation rights, why the written record matters more than the number of sessions, and what consulates can and cannot do.
Two things decide how much damage a case suffers while someone is in custody. The first is what goes into the written record — interrogation transcripts are signed in Chinese and become evidence, and there is no fixed number of sessions, so the count tells you nothing. The second is whether the detainee's consular rights were respected: under Article 36 of the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations, a detained foreign national who asks must have their consulate notified, and must be told of that right without delay. These guides cover what to say and what not to sign, how interrogation actually works in practice, when the embassy gets told, and the hard limits of what a consulate can do once it is.
Consular visits, lawyer lists, welfare monitoring — and the hard limits of consular protection inside Chinese criminal proceedings.
Read the Guide →Transcripts become evidence. The rights a detainee actually has, and the sentences that damage cases most often.
Read the Guide →The count does not matter. What matters is what reaches the Chinese-only written record while the detainee is still shaken.
Watch & Read →Authorities must tell you about consular notification. If nobody does, that alone is a procedural flaw — and the message takes days to reach family.
Watch & Read →