Human rights activists and friends of a Chinese Webmaster accused of subversion say the 38-year-old was back in court this week to continue a trial that was cut short in February when he fainted in a Chengdu, Sichuan province, courtroom.

Huang Qi was arrested more than a year ago and accused of using his "Tianwang Missing Persons" Web site to promote pro-democracy causes. The site, which was moved to a U.S.-based server just prior to his arrest, continues to publish updates on the fate of Huang and his family. According to the U.S.-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), Huang was tried in Chengdu Intermediate Court in a secret proceeding from which his wife and other relatives were barred. No verdict or sentencing date was released, the CPJ said. The CPJ said that, since 1998, 14 people have been arrested in China as a result of information published on the Internet. However, it said Huang's cases is the first to reach the trial stage. A week after Huang fainted in the courtroom earlier this year, the trial was postponed again by officials who said the defendant was too frail. However, critics of China's human rights record pointed out that the decision to postpone the trial coincided with a key visit from international Olympic officials in the process of choosing a venue for the 2008 games. Human Rights Watch (HRW) reported earlier that Huang's Web site originally began as message board available to Chinese Web surfers who posted reports of missing persons. However, HRW said the site soon became a forum where people discussed human rights abuses. On the eve of the 11th anniversary of the June 4, 1989, Tiananmen Square uprising, HRW said, users posted "increasingly critical messages, including an account by a mother who accused police of having beaten her son to death during the crackdown." Police detained Huang and his wife, Zeng Li, that same day. Zeng was released after three days.