China Change : News and commentaries for a free and just China

Reports

In Zion Church Case, Chinese Authorities Punish and Harass Defense Lawyers to Force Them Out
China Change, March 24, 2026 Last October, following the detention of 18 pastors and church workers of Zion Church, including its lead Pastor Jin Mingri (金明日), as many as forty lawyers joined the defense team as the case progressed. The Zion Church members were charged with “the crime of illegally utilizing information networks” and detained in Beihai, Guangxi province. The …
Full Text of Xu Zhiyong’s Court Judgment
China Change, January 29, 2026 In December 2019, Xu Zhiyong, Ding Jiaxi, and more than 20 other Chinese lawyers and ordinary citizens held a two-day gathering in the southeastern city of Xiamen, Fujian province, later referred to as the “Xiamen Gathering.” Shortly afterward, Chinese authorities launched arrests targeting the participants. Many of them fled China or went into hiding. Ding …
The 10th Anniversary of the 709 Crackdown on Human Rights Lawyers and Defenders: Ten Notable Events Over the Past Year
China Change, August 7, 2025 The year 2025 marks the 10th anniversary of the “709” crackdown. A full decade has passed since the mass arrest of lawyers that shocked both China and the world, and this persecution has not ended. Over the past year, several more lawyers have been arrested, sentenced, or placed in administrative detention. Some have been stripped …
Passing Through Luhe Traffic Police Brigade and Songzhuang Police Station – a Nightmare on the Tail of the 10th anniversary of the 709 Crackdown
Li Heping, July 24, 2025 “The 709 crackdown was already one of the greatest injustices of our time. If I am now framed by these traffic police, I might as well smash my head against the wall and die right here.” — Li Heping, 709 lawyer Part One: A Five-hour Wrangling With Luhe Traffic Police Brigade from July 11, 2025, …

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Analysis and Opinions

On Doing Small Things Towards Change – A Book Review
Andréa Worden, January 31, 2026 Xu Zhiyong (许志永), 美好中国 (published in Chinese by Bouden House, NY, 2025).[1] English translations of the 24 essays comprising A Beautiful China are available on the website of China Change. Anthony J. Spires, Everyday Democracy: Civil Society, Youth, and the Struggle Against Authoritarian Culture in China (Columbia University Press, 2024). In Yaxue Cao’s introduction to …
‘Socialist Rule of Law with Chinese Characteristics’: Establishment, Destruction, Reconstruction, Reform, and Reversal
Li Fangping, August 21, 2025 It’s been seven decades since the promulgation of Communist China’s first Constitution in 1954. To evaluate the journey of its rule of law, the successes and failures, I’m going to divide my analysis into four periods. I. The CCP’s founding leaders never meant to honor PRC’s first Constitution The 1954 Constitution of the People’s Republic of …
1,296 Days in Limbo: The Trial of Xie Yang and the Eleven Notices That Delayed It for Thirty-Two Months By Way of Punishment
Yaxue Cao, July 29, 2025 I. At 10 a.m. Beijing time on July 30, 2025, after 1,296 days in detention, lawyer Xie Yang (谢阳) is finally standing trial at the Changsha Intermediate People’s Court. He is charged with “inciting subversion of state power.” This is the second time Xie Yang has been imprisoned since the internationally known “709 Crackdown” on …
A Decade On — It’s Time to Stop
Chen Guiqiu, ex-wife of Xie Yang, July 28, 2025 Human rights lawyer Xie Yang (谢阳) was arrested in January 2022, shortly after displaying a banner in support of an elementary school teacher in his province who had been arbitrarily detained in a mental hospital for online expression. As of today, he has been held for 1,295 days without trial. His …

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Interviews and profiles

A Home in God: The Story of Detained Pastor Jin Mingri and China’s City Churches, Part Two
Yaxue Cao, November 4, 2025 (Continued from Part One) The Birth of Zion Church: In the Open, Not Underground In early 2007, Pastor Jin Mingri, together with his wife and three children, returned to Beijing. By then, China had already undergone over a decade of rapid economic development. From the street level to its skyline, Beijing — rebuilt by cheap …
A Home in God: The Story of Detained Pastor Jin Mingri and China’s City Churches, Part One
Yaxue Cao, October 30, 2025 Zion Church Under Attack On the evening of Saturday, October 10, in Beihai, Guangxi (广西北海), more than twenty police officers stormed into the home of Pastor Jin Mingri (金明日, Ezra Jin), the head pastor of Zion Church (锡安教会), just after he and his elderly mother-in-law had finished dinner. One officer waved a piece of paper …
The Collapse of Yesterday’s World – A Chinese Millennial Journalist’s Chronicle of the ‘Reform and Opening Up’ That Never Was, Part Three
Jia Jia, October 15, 2025 One of the interrogators asked me: Why do you write for Apple Daily? … Are you only doing it for money? I replied: Yes, for money. Suddenly, he was enraged, interrupted me, and sternly said: “No! You’re writing for your ideals!” I was stunned, and could not think of a response. Continued from Part One, …
The Collapse of Yesterday’s World – A Chinese Millennial Journalist’s Chronicle of the ‘Reform and Opening Up’ That Never Was, Part Two
Jia Jia, October 15, 2025 It was a night of jubilation, but I felt melancholic. It was a vague hunch that our optimism was groundless — after all, on every issue, our hopes had always been dashed on a cold and unyielding wall. Continued from Part One 2. Days that Shone Like Gold It was a night of jubilation, but I …

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