Friends fear right-wing connections will hit Chen Guangcheng's credibility

Blind legal activist Chen Guangcheng's association with those in right-wing politics in the US is likely to hurt his reputation and credibility as a human rights advocate, according to scholars and people familiar with him.

Chen released a statement this week accusing New York University, which hosted him for the past year, of ending his fellowship under pressure from the Chinese government. NYU said the fellowship had always been meant to last a year and the allegations were false.

Chen, a high-profile activist who spent years in extra-legal detention and jail for exposing forced abortions, made a dramatic escape from house arrest in his village in Shandong last year and took refuge in the US embassy in Beijing. At the time, the fellowship brokered by NYU China law expert Professor Jerome Cohen helped defuse a diplomatic crisis between Beijing and Washington.

But since his arrival in the US, Chen, a sought-after speaker for fundraising events, has been courted by right-wing politicians and pro-life campaigners.

Scholars and people familiar with Chen are now expressing concern that he has unwittingly become a politicised figure, too aligned with the political right.

Professor Jean-Philippe Beja, a senior researcher at the French Centre on Contemporary China, said exiled activists were political capital for a while after they arrived in the West but siding with one political camp would tend to diminish their credibility. "If you appear to be siding with right extremists, it will hurt your image," Beja said. "The problem with exile is that you are isolated, and when you're isolated, it's easy to be taken advantage of."