A Chinese court has sentenced a leading Chinese dissident to eleven years in prison. Liu Xiaobo was convicted of “inciting subversion of state power.” The human rights activist and academic was arrested after he co-authored a petition called Charter 08 that called for freedom of assembly, expression and religion in China. Human Rights Watch condemned Liu’s conviction, calling it a “travesty of justice.” Liu previously spent twenty-one months in prison for taking part in the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989. Meanwhile, a top Chinese police official has ordered preemptive strikes against perceived threats to social order. In a speech published earlier today, Vice Minister of Public Security Yang Huanning said Chinese officials must step up efforts to curb the enemy by “predicting, preempting and discovering them.” He also urged Chinese police forces to “strike at hostile forces at home and abroad.”