Liu Xiaobo is dead. That’s a fact. And that his death was at least indirectly caused by the cruelty and immorality of the Chinese government is obvious to anyone who has access to information about Liu and his imprisonment.

When I heard the news of Liu’s parole, my first thought was that he was about to die. He wouldn’t otherwise have been allowed to leave prison. The fact of a Nobel Prize winner dying behind bars would be simply too damaging to the authorities.