BEIJING – A Chinese court sentenced a citizen journalist who worked in Wuhan, the city where the Covid-19 pandemic is believed to have started, to four years in prison, confirmed his lawyer.
Zhang Zhan, 37, was one of several citizen journalists whose first-hand accounts of when the virus first appeared almost a year ago painted a more dire picture of the initial outbreak than the government’s official narrative.
Zhang, a former lawyer, arrived in Wuhan in early February from her Shanghai home to document in a series of online posts how the city is resisting the deadly new virus. Some of his posts criticized the Chinese government’s response.
Zhang was arrested in May and accused of spreading false information, giving interviews to foreign media, disturbing the social order and attacking the government.
On Monday, she was convicted on charges of “provoking fights and causing problems,” Zhang’s lawyer, Zhang Keke, who is not related to the citizen journalist, told NBC News on Monday. Zhang did not speak or show any reaction to the court’s decision, his lawyer said, adding that she did not respond when asked if she wanted to appeal the sentence.
Before the sentencing hearing, Zhang said his client went on a “long hunger strike” in prison and was being force-fed.
He said that Zhang suffered from dizziness and headaches and was “physically fragile”.
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“When I met her a few days ago, her hands were tied around her waist and a nasogastric tube was inserted into her nose,” he said, adding that his client did not plead guilty.
“She has a strong will,” said Zhang.
Human rights organization Amnesty International also raised the alarm about Zhang’s health and the “risk of further torture and other ill-treatment” earlier this month.
The United Nations human rights office said in a tweet On Monday, the organization was “deeply concerned” about Zhang’s sentence, adding that it will continue to ask for his release after taking his case to the authorities as an example of “excessive repression of freedom of expression linked to Covid-19”.
China was accused of covering up the initial outbreak and delaying its response, allowing the virus to spread globally. Beijing has denied all accusations, saying it acted quickly to stop the virus, which has claimed nearly 1.8 million lives worldwide.
Criticisms of China’s initial treatment of the crisis have been heavily censored within the country, with whistleblowers silenced and state media hailing China’s success in containing the virus. The country’s health officials say they have registered only 86,976 cases since the pandemic began, while there are more than 80 million cases worldwide.
In the early days of the outbreak, authorities rebuked several doctors in Wuhan for spreading rumors after trying to alert the public to the new virus. The best known of them, Li Wenliang, later died of Covid-19 and became a national hero.
Several other citizen journalists who reported from Wuhan during the beginning of the pandemic also appear to have been targeted.
Fang Bin, who shared videos from Wuhan hospitals on YouTube, has been missing since February. Chen Qiushi, who disappeared in February after making a series of social media posts about the outbreak in the city, is under close surveillance and has not spoken publicly, the South China Morning Post reported. Another citizen journalist who reported from Wuhan, Li Zehua, reappeared in a YouTube video in April after disappearing for nearly two months to say he was quarantined by force.
Eric Baculinao reported from Beijing, Yuliya Talmazan from London.
Reuters and the Associated Press contributed to this report.
Janis Mackey Frayer contributed.