A Chinese Journalist Critical of the Government Has Disappeared

A Chinese journalist based in Beijing, who was collecting signatures for the resignation of the President of China, has disappeared. The lawyer of this journalist announced on Saturday that he went missing at Beijing airport while intending to fly to Hong Kong. Yan Xin, the defense lawyer for Qia Qia, states that he has not been seen since Tuesday. Mr. Xin mentioned that he cannot explicitly say that the Chinese government and security officials have kidnapped him, as local police, airport authorities, and immigration officials claim to have no information regarding this matter. However, friends of Qia say that he recently told one of his friends, who is an editor of a newspaper, that he had anonymously prepared a letter asking the President of China to resign and was collecting online signatures for this letter. Friends of Qia believe that this statement led to his disappearance. Meanwhile, CNN reports, citing Qia's lawyer, that his client has not prepared any letter against Xi Jinping. According to Qia's friends, his letter was briefly published on the government website 'Wuchi' less than a month ago and attracted significant attention from those following politics in China. In this letter, Xi Jinping's economic and domestic policies were criticized, and it was mentioned that various branches of the Chinese Communist Party have increasingly encountered issues with Xi's policies. The letter was quickly removed, and Wuchi officials claimed that their website had been hacked. According to the law, the Chinese police are required to inform a person's family within 24 hours of their arrest unless the individual is considered an immediate threat to national security. However, in sensitive political cases, many arrests occur secretly and remain hidden. In this case, Qia's wife states that she has heard nothing from him so far. Qia has worked for various newspapers in China and Hong Kong for years, and his insistence on continuously criticizing the Chinese government, financial corruption, and censorship over the years has put him in the spotlight of security officials. This is not the first time someone has disappeared in China without a trace. This fall, the owner of the Kazuy publishing house (in Hong Kong) disappeared, and shortly after, the executive director and manager of a bookstore also went missing one by one, with no information about them or their whereabouts available. The Kazuy publishing house has had a long history of selling banned books in China, and many would even travel from China to Hong Kong to purchase these books.