In a forthcoming special report set to air on Sky News Australia, Cheng Lei, an Australian journalist recently released after over three years of incarceration in China, will be sharing intimate details about her ordeal.
The broadcast is scheduled for 7:00pm AEDT on Tuesday, 17 October during The Bolt Report on Sky News.
Cheng Lei, an anchor for China’s CGTN network, was detained in August 2020. Charges against her claimed involvement in illicitly transferring state secrets overseas. The gravity of her capture was not immediately publicised. The alarm was only raised when her partner, alarmed by the disappearance of her computers and passport from her residence, contacted authorities.
The global frenzy around the COVID-19 pandemic underscored Lei‘s detention. Her arrest exacerbated already strained Sino-Australian ties and shone a light on the realities of detention conditions in China.
With Prime Minister Anthony Albanese poised for a trip to Beijing soon, the 48-year-old mother of two has now been repatriated to Australia.
During the interview, conducted by Sky News Washington Correspondent Annelise Nielsen, Lei poignantly recalls her prolonged incarceration, the strategies she deployed to stay hopeful, and her profoundly emotional reunion with her children and mother in Melbourne. “free at last moment”, she terms it.
Annelise Nielsen, previously a coworker of Lei at CGTN, has remained at the forefront of the campaign championing Lei‘s release for the past three years.
