When blind Chinese activist Chen Guangcheng sought refuge at the U.S. Embassy in Beijing in April 2012 after escaping from house arrest, he created one of the most delicate diplomatic crises of Hillary Clinton's tenure as Secretary of State — and put her at the center of a case that tested the competing demands of human rights advocacy and geopolitical pragmatism.

Chen, a self-taught lawyer who had spent years documenting forced sterilizations and forced abortions carried out under China's one-child policy enforcement in Shandong province, had been imprisoned and then subjected to extralegal house arrest after his release. His dramatic escape — blind, having evaded dozens of guards — and his arrival at the American Embassy came just days before Clinton was scheduled to visit Beijing for the Strategic and Economic Dialogue.

The timing could not have been worse from a diplomatic standpoint. The U.S. needed China's cooperation on a range of issues — North Korea, Iran, trade, the South China Sea — and a public confrontation over a human rights case would strain a relationship that both governments were carefully managing.

Chen initially agreed to leave the embassy and remain in China after U.S. officials negotiated assurances of his safety from the Chinese government. Within days, he changed his mind, calling journalists from a hospital bed to say he feared for his life and wanted to leave China.

Clinton ultimately navigated a resolution in which Chen was allowed to travel to the United States to study law at New York University — a compromise that gave China face while preserving Chen's safety and the U.S. its credibility on human rights.

Chen became one of the most visible symbols of China's human rights situation in the Obama years, and his case illustrated the impossible balance that American diplomacy must perpetually strike between interests and values.