Totalitarian Regime Returns to China

The knock on the door was a long time coming, but it seems that Ai Weiwei's luck has finally run out. On Sunday morning, the Chinese artist – whose tiny porcelain sunflower seeds have filled Tate Modern's Turbine Hall for the past six months – was about to board a flight to Hong Kong for a business trip, when he was stopped by officials. Simultaneously, teams of police raided his studio-cum-home in north-east Beijing, removing computers and documents. No one has heard from him since.