Trial to Start Next Week for Chinese Australian Journalist

Australian officials announced on Saturday that a Chinese-Australian journalist who has been detained in China since August 2020 will be tried next week.

CGTN journalist Cheng Lei | Photo Credits: Piaras Ó Mídheach | Sportsfile | Getty Images

CGTN journalist Cheng Lei was initially detained and was later formally arrested on suspicion of supplying state secrets abroad. Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne said the Chinese government informed Australia that the trial will take place on Thursday. “We expect basic standards of justice, procedural fairness and humane treatment to be met, in accordance with international norms,” the statement said.

National Press Clubs in both Australia and the United States, as well as former CGTN colleagues and friends wrote open letters last year asking that she be released immediately. In a statement, the U.S. National Press Club said that Cheng Lei's yearlong detention violates journalistic ethics and human rights.

Australia has expressed concern about Cheng's welfare and detention conditions. In her statement, Payne stated that government officials last visited her on March 21. They asked to be permitted to attend the trial.

Originally from China, Cheng graduated from the University of Queensland. Prior to becoming a journalist, she worked as an accountant and financial analyst in Australia for Cadbury Schweppes and ExxonMobil from 1995 to 2000, according to her CGTN profile.

After moving to China in 2001, she joined the state broadcaster CCTV the following year, and was subsequently the China correspondent for CNBC Asia for nine years before returning to CCTV in 2012. She hosted a business program for CGTN, the international arm of the state broadcaster.