Australian journalist says she was detained for 3 years in China for breaking an embargo

Cheng Lei, an Australian journalist, spent 3 years in detention in China for breaking an embargo with a TV broadcast. She was freed & returned to her family in Melbourne

Australian journalist Cheng Lei says she spent more than three years in detention in China for breaking an embargo with a television broadcast on a state-run TV network.

Ms. Cheng‘s first television interview since she was freed was broadcast in Australia on Tuesday almost a week after she returned to her mother and two children, aged 11 and 14, in the city of Melbourne.

The Chinese-born 48-year-old was an English-language anchor for state-run China Global Television Network in Beijing when she was detained in August 2020.

She said her offense was breaking a government-imposed embargo by a few minutes following a briefing by officials.

Her treatment in custody was designed to “drive home that point that in China that is a big sin,” Ms. Cheng told Sky News Australia. “That you have hurt the motherland and that the state’s authority has been eroded because of you.”

“What seems innocuous to us here is — I’m sure it’s not limited to embargoes, but many other things — are not in China, especially (because) I’m given to understand that the gambit of state security is widening,” she said.

Ms. Cheng did not give details about the embargo breach.