Beijing jails two activists for 15 months: they published banned articles on Covid

Judges hold Chen Mei and Cai Wei as guilty of creating "disorder". Having already served their sentences, they could be released tomorrow. They had published an interview with Ai Fen, the doctor who had raised the alarm about the coronavirus.

Beijing (AsiaNews/Agencies) - The Chaoyang District Court yesterday sentenced two activists to 15 months in prison for publishing 100 articles online on the coronavirus crisis censored by the government. The sentence was announced by the brother of one of the defendants.

The judges hold Chen Mei and Cai Wei guilty of creating "disorder," a charge often used by police to suppress dissent. The two have been in pre-trial detention in Beijing since their arrest on April 19 last year. Having already served their sentences, Chen and Cai could be released from prison tomorrow.

The two activists had posted on GitHub - the world's largest open-source website - the interview Ai Fen gave to People magazine on March 10, 2020. Ai is the Wuhan-based doctor who first raised the alarm about Covid-19.

For two years, through their collective project "Terminus 2049," Chen and Cai have been circulating material banned by the authorities, including articles about the "MeToo" movement against gender violence and discrimination, and the eviction of large numbers of migrant workers from some Beijing homes.

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Beijing jails two activists for 15 months: they published banned articles on Covid

Beijing jails two activists for 15 months: they published banned articles on Covid

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