By the time of Sunday, Australian TV host Cheng Lei will have been imprisoned in China for three years. In a rare statement, Cheng Lei expressed her longing for her Australian family and way of life.
I long for the sun. I can only stand in the sunlight in my jail for ten hours a year, she said in a message posted on Thursday by her partner Nick Coyle on the FreeChengLei X account that he manages.
Coyle revealed to CNN that the communication had been shared with him and communicated to foreign officials.
In her message, Cheng wrote, “I can’t believe I used to avoid the sun when I was living back in Australia.”
I haven’t seen a tree in three years, Cheng remarked, calling it a “love letter” to Australia.
Mother of two and former business anchor for China’s national television network CGTN Cheng faces a sentence of between five years and life in jail if found guilty of unlawfully exporting state secrets.
On the morning of August 13, 2020, she “was taken by China’s Ministry of State Security,” according to Coyle in a letter that was printed in The Australian newspaper in May. She was en route to work at the time.
The accusations against Cheng are still being withheld by Chinese officials.
The Chinese court has repeatedly postponed rendering a decision, putting Cheng in detention and her loved ones in the dark about her future.
Cheng expressed her love for Australia in a letter made public on Thursday, adding, “I miss the Australian people.”
“I remember going camping for the first time with my family,” she recalls. “I miss the sweet wildlife encounters in Australia, the sea salt whirling in my ear,” the speaker said.
“I relive every bushwalk, river, lake, beach with swims and picnics and psychedelic sunsets, sky that is lit up with stars, and the silent and secret symphony of the bush,” the woman claims.
She concluded her letter by saying, “I miss my children the most.
According to Coyle, Cheng only contacts him after her monthly consular trips, which take place.
