Bo Xilai's family complains of Chinese government obstacles to his defense The new details about Bo's legal struggles came amid a four-day meeting of the National People's Congress, which is expected to strip him of his legal immunity, paving the way for criminal charges. Bo had been one of China's most prominent politicians and a contender for a seat on the country's ruling council until his wife and a top lieutenant were charged and convicted this year in the murder of a British businessman. His spectacular downfall triggered the country's biggest political scandal in two decades, and lingering questions about Bo's fate have cast a pall over China's once-a-decade leadership transition, scheduled for next month. His whereabouts have been kept secret for months. But a friend of Bo's wife, Gu Kailai, and a second person associated with her family said Bo is being held at Qincheng, a facility famous for its political prisoners. The prison is an hour north of Beijing and has housed other purged leaders, as well as protesters from the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown and, most famously, Mao Zedong's widow. Bo's brothers and sisters have been instructed not to find him lawyers, and Bo's brothers have also warned his two sons, one living in the United States and the other in Hong Kong, to do the same, according to the family friend. But, the family associates said, Gu's mother, Fan Chengxiu, retained two lawyers for him Oct. 6: Shen Zhigeng, who was hired to represent Gu at her murder trial two months ago, and Li Xiaolin, who was hired to represent Gu's aide, Zhang Xiaojun, who was charged and sentenced to prison in the Gu case. In a brief phone interview, Li confirmed he was hired to represent Bo by his mother-in-law but declined to go into detail. Reached separately, the second lawyer declined to comment. According others involved, the lawyers plan to go to Bo's prison in coming days in a last-ditch effort to see him if they do not hear back from authorities on their request that they be allowed access. Rejecting such face-to-face meetings has become a standard way for the Chinese government to deny independent representation in politically sensitive cases that could embarrass the party. When authorities arrested the nephew of blind dissident Chen Guangcheng this year, authorities told his family's lawyers, without providing evidence, that Chen's nephew wanted to use a government-appointed attorney instead. Bo's wife was treated similarly at her murder trial last summer. Authorities have also kept secret the location of Gu ever since she pleaded guilty to murder in August after proceedings that many Chinese and Western legal critics have likened to a show trial. According to a prison document shown to Washington Post reporters, Gu was transferred Sept. 12 to a facility called Yancheng in Hebei province, on the outskirts of Beijing. The document, which was stamped with the Yancheng prison's official red seal and dated Sept. 17, was addressed to one of Gu's sisters, Gu Zhengxie. Yancheng is China's only prison directly managed by the central Justice Ministry; all others are managed locally. The prison is rumored to be well-appointed with everyday luxuries and, according to descriptions on the ministry's Web site, is often used to house officials convicted of corruption and international prisoners. The document could not be independently verified, but the family friend said Gu's mother and sister tried to visit Gu upon receiving the letter. They were met by a deputy warden who refused their request, saying Gu first needed two months of "prisoner's training." The family of Zhang, Gu's aide, have been able to visit him since the trial, according to associates of family. After the failed attempt to see Gu at Yancheng, her mother wrote a letter to the China's Justice Minister, Wu Aiying, the family friend said. As the widow of a general in China's army and a former high-level official, Gu's mother told the minister she respected the discipline of the party but pleaded for a chance to see her daughter. Zhang Jie and Keith Richburg contributed to this report.