Free Republic

Hong Kong CNN — A Chinese citizen journalist who has been behind bars for four years over her reporting on the initial Covid-19 outbreak in Wuhan is due to be released Monday after serving her sentence, according to supporters and a court verdict. Zhang Zhan, a former lawyer, was one of the few independent Chinese journalists reporting in Wuhan after the metropolis of 11 million people went into a complete lockdown, offering a rare, unfiltered glimpse into the reality on the ground as Chinese authorities imposed tight censorship on media coverage. She was detained in May 2020 and sentenced months...

Authorities in China were expected on Monday to release a citizen journalist jailed for four years after she documented the early phases of the coronavirus outbreak from the central city of Wuhan in 2020. Zhang Zhan, 40, had travelled to Wuhan in early 2020 from Shanghai where she was based, posting first-hand accounts ... After several months of reporting that included videos.. she was detained in May 2020. She went on hunger strike in late June, court documents seen by Reuters said, prompting police to strap her hands and force-feed her with a tube, her lawyers said at the time....