Leader of Early Rain Covenant, which is not sanctioned by Communist party, swept up in crackdown on religion under Xi Jinping

This article is more than 8 months old

This article is more than 8 months old

A Chinese court has sentenced the pastor Wang Yi to nine years in prison on charges of inciting subversion of state power and illegally operating a business.

Wang was among dozens of churchgoers and leaders of the Early Rain Covenant church detained by police in December 2018. Most were subsequently released.

The church is one of China’s best-known unregistered Protestant “house” churches. Chinese law requires that places of worship register and submit to government oversight but some decline to do so and are called house churches.

China’s constitution guarantees religious freedom but since Xi Jinping became president six years ago the government has tightened restrictions on religions seen as a challenge to the authority of the Communist party.

In China, they’re closing churches, jailing pastors – and even rewriting scripture Read more

The government has cracked down on underground churches, both Protestant and Catholic, and has rolled out new legislation to increase oversight of religious education and practices, with harsher punishment for practices not sanctioned by authorities.

According to the statement posted on the website of the Chengdu court in the western province of Sichuan, Wang has also been deprived of his political rights for three years and 50,000 yuan (£5,460/US$7,160) of his personal property was confiscated.

China also sentenced Nobel peace prize winning dissident Liu Xiaobo in 2009 to 11 years in prison on charges of inciting subversion of state power. Liu died in prison in 2017 after he was denied permission to leave China for treatment for late-stage liver cancer.