{"id":29988,"date":"2025-08-01T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-07-31T23:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/csw-yeo.1wp.site\/press\/pastor-formally-arrested-on-charges-of-illegal-business-operations-6593\/"},"modified":"2026-09-23T19:14:24","modified_gmt":"2026-09-23T18:14:24","slug":"pastor-formally-arrested-on-charges-of-illegal-business-operations-6593","status":"publish","type":"press","link":"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/zh\/press\/pastor-formally-arrested-on-charges-of-illegal-business-operations-6593\/","title":{"rendered":"Pastor formally arrested on charges of ‘illegal business operations’"},"content":{"rendered":"
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A prominent Protestant pastor in Wenzhou in China\u2019s Zhejiang Province was informed that he had been formally arrested on charges of \u2018illegal business operations\u2019 for selling recordings of sermons on 30 July.<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Pastor Huang Yizi was taken into custody by Pingyang Public Security alongside four other church members from Ningbo, Quzhou and Taizhou, all also in Zhejiang Province, on 26 June. All five were administratively detained the following day; two were released on bail on 25 July, while two others remain in detention; the charges against them are unclear. Another church member was reportedly detained on 17 July and remains in detention.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Under China\u2019s Criminal Procedure Law, public security authorities must submit a request for formal arrest to the procuratorate within 30 days of initial detention. Huang\u2019s representative believed that his case was transferred<\/a> for review on 25 July, the final day of the permitted detention period, with an outcome expected within days. However, the representative discovered that Huang\u2019s name was already listed as \u2018arrest approved\u2019 on the Supreme People\u2019s Procuratorate of China\u2019s official portal<\/a> on the same day, without prior notice or documentation from public security officials. Huang himself was notified of the arrest on 30 July; he was told that the case was reviewed on 28 July and that the arrest was approved the following day.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The representative expressed concern to a CSW source regarding the unusually swift processing of the arrest, raising questions about the depth and transparency of the review conducted by the procuratorate.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Huang was first detained in 2014 for protesting the forced demolition<\/a> of church crosses by the Wenzhou authorities and subsequently sentenced to one year in prison. Less than a month after his release, on 12 September 2015, he was again detained,<\/a> this time on charges of \u2018endangering national security\u2019. He was held under residential surveillance at a designated location (RSDL, a form of secret detention) for nearly five months.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Prior to the mass demolition of crosses in Wenzhou in 2014, Huang\u2019s church, like most in the region, operated as a government-sanctioned Three-Self Patriotic Movement (TSSPM) church.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The ChineseHumanRightsLawyersGroup condemned<\/a> the Chinese authorities for frequently using vague charges like \u2018illegal business operations\u2019 to target religious communities. They argue that freedom of religion or belief (FoRB) includes the right to practise such as the recording and sharing of sermons, which should be protected by the constitutional law.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

CSW\u2019s Founder President Mervyn Thomas said:<\/span>\u2018CSW condemns the formal arrest of Pastor Huang Yizi. We call for his immediate and unconditional release and insist that the Chinese authorities must uphold the rule of law in all cases involving members of religious communities, allowing the accused access to legal representation of their choosing, and ensuring that any legal proceedings are conducted fairly and in accordance with national and international legal standards.\u2019<\/i><\/b><\/span><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A prominent Protestant pastor in Wenzhou, Zhejiang Province was informed that he had been formally arrested on charges of illegal business operations for selling recordings of sermons on 30 July.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":44124,"template":"","categories":[],"regions":[131,128],"class_list":["post-29988","press","type-press","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","regions-china","regions-east-asia"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/press\/29988","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/press"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/press"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/press\/29988\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":40574,"href":"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/press\/29988\/revisions\/40574"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44124"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29988"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29988"},{"taxonomy":"regions","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/zh\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/regions?post=29988"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}