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Huang Yizi

• Pastor Arrested for "Illegal Business Operations"

  

  Pastor Huang Yizi, a prominent church leader in Wenzhou, Zhejiang Province, was informed on July 30th that he had been formally charged with "illegal business practices" relating to the distribution of sermon recordings. The Christian leader and several other church members were initially taken into custody on June 26th. At the time, the reason for their arrests was unclear. (A previously published report about the arrests is available here.) However, following the recent announcement of formal charges, further information has now come to light.

• Arrests of Church Leader and Four Other Christians

  

  Pastor Huang Yizi is a well-known house church leader in China's Zhejiang Province. For more than a decade, he has encountered repeated harassment and imprisonment for his Christian faith. In 2014, the pastor was arrested and sentenced to one year in prison after publicly protesting the government's campaign to remove crosses from church buildings across the province. He was arrested again in September 2015 and held for five months in a "black jail," where he had been forbidden from contacting his family and legal representatives. In 2021, Pastor Huang reported that he was being constantly monitored by the authorities and subjected to random interrogations (read more).

• Publisher Faces Three-Year Sentence; Pastor Faces Ongoing Harassment

  

  Geng Xiaonan, a well-known Chinese businesswoman who was charged with "illegal business practices," has been sentenced to three years in prison. Geng and her husband Qin Zhen were founders of an independent publishing house and have also worked in television and film. As previously reported in October 2020 (see more here), Geng had publicly expressed her concerns over the injustices and abuses committed by the Chinese Communist Party.