Mysterious fences have begun appearing overnight blocking city thoroughfares in Shanghai amid a grueling COVID-19 lockdown affecting some 26 million people, residents told RFA
Police in the central Chinese province of Hunan have ordered local residents to hand over their passports to police, promising to return them “when the pandemic is over,” amid a massive surge in people looking for ways to leave China or obtain overseas immigration status
The Shanghai lockdown has prompted an exodus of foreign students and teaching staff, as the city reported its first deaths from COVID-19
Wang Jixian is Chinese national living in Odessa who turned citizen journalist when the war in Ukraine began, posting first-hand accounts of the conflict. But his outspoken YouTube videos cursing out Russian troops were out of step with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)’s official stance on the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and have been deleted or blocked from social media platforms in China by government censors, while Wang’s personal social media accounts have been shut down
Lawyers for jailed pro-democracy media magnate Jimmy Lai, who is awaiting trial under a draconian national security law, have called on the United Nations to investigate the multiple criminal cases against him
Authorities in the southern province of Guangdong have moved to prosecute feminist activist and journalist Sophia Huang and fellow activist Wang Jianbing, rights groups reported
Public satisfaction with the media in Hong Kong has hit rock bottom, according to a recent public opinion survey
Yaxue Cao, editor-in-chief of the U.S.-based website China Change, has been tracking human rights issues in China for years. With the help of human rights attorneys in China, dissident artist Ai Weiwei, professor and film-maker Ai Xiaoming and overseas-based rights activist, she recently released an hour-long film about the crucial role played by Chinese lawyers in defending people’s basic rights. The documentary, titled “The Defenders — 20 Years of Human Rights Lawyers in China,” offers rarely-seen footage of top rights attorneys including Li Heping, Jiang Tianyong and Pu Zhiqiang to an overseas audience. Cao spoke to RFA’s Mandarin Service about the project
A Uyghur farmer jailed for moving his pregnant wife from their hometown in Xinjiang to prevent authorities from forcing her to have an abortion died in 2020 while serving an eight-year prison sentence, a Uyghur with knowledge of the situation and local police officials confirmed to RFA this month
Public anger over widespread trafficking in women and girls, mostly for “marriage” to men who can’t find willing partners, is running in high in China since a woman was found chained by the neck in a freezing outbuilding in the eastern province of Jiangsu in January