I believe it's a fixed impression that people get that China's human rights situation is improving. If you checked some free media, media outside China, you would see that China's human rights situation is not improving, but in fact is going backward.
For example, Internet restrictions in China are still going on. Free association and organized activities are not allowed, even though they are not intended to go through the government but are just some people who want to get together to do something.
If you are interested, I have a long list of those organizations that have been crushed by the government.