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Sidney Leng

Laura Zhou

The Chinese hostage killed by Islamic State extremists was a 50-year-old advertising freelancer who drifted through life and thrived on insecurity, according to an interview he gave mainland media in 2001.
The death of Fan Jinghui - and that his Norwegian fellow hostage Ole Johan Grimsgaard-Ofstad - was reported in terror group Islamic State's English-language magazine Dabiq on Thursday. The confirmation of his death, by shooting, came just months after IS released a poster of him in a yellow jumpsuit to demand a ransom.
But beyond these few details, precious little is known for sure about Fan.
The poster, released in September, included what IS claimed was Fan’s home address. It pointed to an advertising firm registered in western Beijing.
READ MORE: China flags ‘fight’ against terrorism as it confirms for first time Islamic State has executed hostage Fan Jinghui
Public records showed the firm’s founder was a Fan Jinghui, but the company, located on the fifth floor of a low-rise residential building, had closed in September 2003.
A South China Morning Post reporter visited the address on Thursday following the announcement of Fan’s death.
A security guard denied having seen either Fan or his wife and claimed the couple did not live there.
But in September, neighbours of the property told The Beijing News that Fan’s wife, surnamed Zhang, taught at a middle school and the pair had a son.
The neighbour said Fan had disappeared a long time ago.
When the SCMP visited the Beijing Shijingshan Experimental Junior High School on Thursday, its security guard said Fan’s wife had been working there in the morning but she had been called away, and he hadn’t seen government officials visit the school.
A photograph purporting to be of Fan circulated online after his capture was reported in September. The picture was an alumni profile photo released by a high school attached to Beijing Normal University for its 60th anniversary. It showed students graduating in 1984, but the school has never confirmed whether it was indeed the same man.
Fan appears to have been interviewed in 2001 by Bai Yansong, a CCTV host who then worked as an anchor at state-run China National Radio.
A transcript of the interview on news portal Sina portrayed Fan as a young man who had drifted between various jobs and enjoyed the freedom of freelancing since 1997.
In the interview, Fan says that after he graduated from university he taught at a middle school for six years before moving into “business” in 1994. He took jobs at an advertising firm, a department store and even at state media CCTV, where he worked as a personal assistant for a producer.
Fan said that at the end of 1996 he got an opportunity to write advertising copy that paid him 2,000 yuan (HK$2,400) for three days.
I’m pursuing a sense of insecurity on purpose. Because it can give me a thrill, because many young people like to read those martial arts novels, all the killing, that feeling of being itinerant - that kind of feeling, to many youth, has a great deal of temptation
Fan Jinghui
Soon, Fan found making a living was easy. “I told myself, I must become a free man...Youth are chasing after freedom, I can make money with freedom, so why not?” he said.
Fan had also talked of his hopes of winning an award for China at a Cannes advertising festival.
Asked by the moderator how long he thought it would take him to achieve his goal of winning at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, Fan said he didn’t know.
When the anchor asked Fan whether he felt insecure drifting between jobs, he replied, “to some extent, I’m pursuing a sense of insecurity on purpose.
“Because it can give me a thrill, because many young people like to read those martial arts novels, all the killing, that feeling of being itinerant - that kind of feeling, to many youth, has a great deal of temptation. It’s just that they are constrained by pressure that comes from life, from reality, from the environment, the family, so they don’t make these sorts of choices.
“But if one day, they also were able to have a guarantee for their life, I believe that a great deal of people would also make the choice to be drifters.”


A drifter who thrived on insecurity: the Chinese hostage killed by Islamic State

This combination of undated photos taken from the Islamic State group's online magazine Dabiq purports to show Ole Johan Grimsgaard-Ofstad, 48, from Oslo, Norway, left, and Fan Jinghui, 50, from Beijing, China. The extremist group claimed on Wednesday, Sept. 9, 2015, to be holding the men hostage and demanded ransom for their release. (Dabiq via AP)

Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Hong Lei speaks during a daily briefing at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs office in Beijing Thursday, Nov. 19, 2015. China's President Xi Jinping on Thursday strongly condemned the killing of hostage Fan Jinghui by the Islamic State group, saying such groups are enemies of mankind, and Lei said China made all-out efforts to save Fan, but did not specify what actions were taken. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)

The poster released in September by Islamic State's magazine Dabiq, showing Ole Johan Grimsgaard-Ofstad, from Norway, and Fan Jinghui, 50, from Beijing. Photo: AP

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A drifter who thrived on insecurity: the Chinese hostage killed by Islamic State

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.css-jfmysa{display:inline;word-break:break-word;}.css-1ankfgb{cursor:pointer;display:inline;word-break:break-word;}READ MORE: China flags ‘fight’ against terrorism as it confirms for first time Islamic State has executed hostage Fan Jinghui

READ MORE: China flags ‘fight’ against terrorism as it confirms for first time Islamic State has executed hostage Fan Jinghui