PEN America champions the freedom to write, recognizing the power of the word to transform the world. The bedrock work of the global PEN network is advocacy and assistance on behalf of individuals persecuted for their use of the written word or other forms of expression. PEN America’s Writers at Risk Database is a searchable catalog of the writers, journalists, academics, public intellectuals and others under threat around the world. The database includes historical cases PEN America has worked on from 1987 onwards; non-active cases are color-coded black. PEN America is grateful to the John Templeton Foundation for support that enabled the establishment of the Writers at Risk Database and to PEN International for their collaboration in assembling this database.
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Leading dissident writer Zhang spent two years in a labor camp in the late ’90s. He was imprisoned again in September 2006 and was denied medical treatment until his release in June 2010. On December 31, 2010, he passed away from Lou Gehrig’s Disease.
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Zhang Wenfang posted poems about the Wuhan lockdown due to COVID-19. She was first detained on “picking quarrels and provoking trouble” and later sentenced to six months in prison after being found guilty on “knowingly spreading false information and causing serious disruption to public order.” She was released on October…
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Online commentator Zhang was arrested by the Chinese authorities and charged with “picking quarrels and provoking trouble” for comments he made on WeChat, Moments, and QQ chat groups. Zhang was discussing topics related to democracy. He has been in detention awaiting trial since November 15, 2022.
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Zhang Xuezhong was detained by police after he published a letter calling on the National People’s Congress to draft a new constitution and criticized their handling of the COVID-19 pandemic. He was detained the night of May 10, 2020 and released less than two days later. In February 2021, he…
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After seven months in pretrial detention, on December 28, 2020, a court sentenced Zhang, a citizen journalist covering COVID-19, to four years in prison for “picking quarrels and stirring up trouble.” The indictment cites her reporting and overseas interviews. Zhang went on hunger strike in prison, transitioning from a full…
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Zhao was released from detention but remains confined to house arrest as of October 2019 after publishing poems entitled “Dark Night Journey” and “Mongolian Grassland” that criticized China’s treatment of its ethnic minorities.
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Theater director and poet Zhenya Berkovich was detained for allegedly “justifying terrorism” in her play “Finist, the Brave Falcon. She was arrested along with Svetlana Petriychuk on May 4, 2023 and held in extended pre-trial detention. The play was about women who meet jihadists on the internet to go to…
Writers at Risk Database Key:
STATUS box that is red: Active case
STATUS box that is black: Inactive case
PEN America is deeply grateful to the John Templeton Foundation for its generous support of the Freedom to Write Index and Writers at Risk Database.
PEN America thanks the PEN International Secretariat and the Writers in Prison Committee for their extensive contributions to and collaboration on compiling the cases included in this database.