China charges blogger who questioned official death toll in India border clash
- Qiu, who has 2.4 million Weibo followers, is charged after being among those detained under newly updated law against defaming ‘heroes’
- His post said that since the four Chinese soldiers killed had been sent to rescue a colonel, more must have died
The comments came after China said that four of its soldiers had been killed and one seriously wounded during June’s clash in the Himalayas.
Qiu, who has 2.4 million followers on China’s Twitter-like Weibo, was formally charged for online comments that prosecutors in the eastern city of Nanjing said “distorted facts, defamed five soldiers who defended the Chinese border, and have led to severely negative social impacts”.
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The country’s top legislature in 2018 passed a law criminalising those who “insult, defame or infringe the reputation and honour of heroes and martyrs”. The law has been criticised as being a means of silencing people for challenging the official narrative.
An amendment to the law that comes into effect this month states that those committing the offence will face up to three years in prison.