Haze Fan is a Chinese citizen and has worked for the international news agency Bloomberg since 2017. She has previously worked for Reuters, CNBC and Al Jazeera in Beijing, among others. In December 2020, she was arrested in her apartment by plainclothes police, officially suspected of violating the National Security Act.
Now the Chinese embassy in Washington states that Haze Fan should have been released on bail in January this year, according to Bloomberg. But it is only now, six months later, that her employer Bloomberg has been informed.
The news agency writes that despite the release, they have not managed to get in touch with Haze Fan.
– She is a much appreciated part of our agency in Beijing and we will continue to do everything we can to help her and her family, says the news agency’s editor-in-chief John Micklethwait in a statement.
“They want to hide the person”
The European human rights organization Safeguard Defenders believes that Haze Fan is under some kind of house arrest and that “release” is a way for China to divert criticism.
– That Bloomberg has not had contact with her in six months makes it clear that she is either under direct control or indirectly out of fear, says Laura Harth, campaign manager for SVT News.
– Until she is released, which is not likely in the near future, it will be difficult to know what will happen. And that’s what the Chinese authorities want to achieve, they want to hide the person from the public.
China arrests most journalists
According to Bloomberg, a trial is expected to continue against Haze Fan, who risks life imprisonment. The Chinese regime has previously leveled accusations of violations of the National Security Act against a number of journalists.
This year, China is ranked 175th out of 180 in the organization Reporters Without Borders press freedom index. In a report from 2021, the organization states that China is the country in the world that arrests the most journalists. According to the latest information, 127 journalists are imprisoned.
The most important thing to help Haze Fan and others in the same situation is to continue talking about her, says Laura Harth from Safeguard Defenders.
– It does not give her freedom, but some kind of protection.