2023-08-10 12:27:21
Stephen McDonell, BBC China Correspondent
9 hours ago
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Cheng Lei has been detained since 2020.
An Australian journalist who will complete three years in China’s prison this weekend has spoken publicly for the first time.
“I miss the sun. In my cell, the sun shone in through the windows, but I only had 10 hours a year to stand under it,” Cheng Lei said in an open letter to the Australian people. The letter was granted monthly visits Her diplomat notes.
“I can’t believe I was hiding from the sun when I was living in Australia.”
“I haven’t seen a tree in three years,” she said.
The financial reporter, who worked for the official English-language TV station China Global Television Network (CGTN) before his arrest, spent the first six months in solitary confinement without charge.
In March last year, Cheng Lei was tried in secret and has been waiting for a verdict for one year and four months.
Australian ambassador to China Fu Guanhan (Graham Fletcher) tried to enter the court to observe the trial process, but failed.
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On March 31, 2022, the trial of Cheng Lei’s case began. The Australian ambassador to China, Graham Fletcher, came to the scene and asked to attend the trial but was refused.
Even her family members don’t know what crime she was charged with, only that she was involved in providing “state secrets”.
China has a vague definition of what constitutes a state secret, which can involve anything the government finds sensitive.
The letters released today are full of her vision for life in Australia. When she was only 10 years old, her family immigrated to Australia from Hunan Province.
“In 1987, I remember the first time I went camping with my family and my dad was driving a 700 yuan (Australian dollar; US$459; 3300 yuan) car,” she said.
“I’m always reliving every bush walk, river, lake, beach swim, picnic and sunset, starry sky, and the peaceful, mysterious symphony of the jungle.”
The former TV anchor said she would always “quietly recite the names of places I’ve been to and driven by” in prison.
In the letter, which was described as a “love letter to 25 million people”, Cheng Lei said that she recalled the friendship given by strangers and friends, and these memories “come back to me once more, let me (in prison) regain Gain confidence”.
She says she misses sea salt, dark humor, the tropics of Queensland and the endless blue skies and sand between her toes in Western Australia.
Some people speculate that the postponement of Cheng Lei’s sentencing is to be used by the Chinese government as a bargaining chip in negotiations with Australia.
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese (Anthony Albanese, also translated as Albanese) was invited to visit China to meet with Xi Jinping. However, he did not declare that he would wait until Cheng Lei and another Australian citizen, Yang Hengjun, were released before visiting China. Quite stressful.
The letter seemed to contain the most important message at the end: “Most of all, I miss the children.”
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Chinese-Australian anchor Cheng Lei has been detained, making China-Australia relations worse
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