Cheng Lei on her fight for freedom

2025-06-25

Cheng Lei was riding high in a successful career as a news anchor in China when her life changed in an instant. Lei is a Chinese born Australian citizen and mother of two, who spent more than three years detained in a Beijing prison after being wrongly accused of illegally supplying state secrets. In this emotional and candid conversation, Julia and Lei delve into her early life in China and then Melbourne, her exciting journalism career around Asia and the ordeal that changed her and her family’s lives forever.

Cheng Lei was riding high in a successful career as a news anchor in China when her life changed in an instant.

Lei is a Chinese born Australian citizen and mother of two, who spent more than three years detained in a Beijing prison after being wrongly accused of illegally supplying state secrets.

In this emotional and candid conversation, Julia and Lei delve into her early life in China and then Melbourne, her exciting journalism career around Asia and the ordeal that changed her and her family’s lives forever.

Show notes

Cheng Lei’s book A Memoir of Freedom is published by Harper Collins and is available at all good bookstores.

Her documentary Cheng Lei: My Story is available via Sky News.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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