HONG KONG — The event on the sidelines of the Conservative Party of Britain’s annual conference was meant to discuss “the erosion of freedom, the rule of law and autonomy in Hong Kong.” It featured several generations of prominent democracy supporters from the former British colony.

Near the end of the talk Sunday in Birmingham, England, Benedict Rogers, a human-rights activist and critic of the Chinese government, was concluding his remarks by saying, “I am pro-China, not anti-China. I want China and its people to succeed.”

Then a woman began shouting from the audience. “You are a liar. You are anti-China. You want to separate China,” shouted the woman, according to attendees. “And you are not even Chinese. The rest are all traitors!”

Image The CGTN reporter, Kong Linlin, was arrested on suspicion of assault and later released pending an investigation. Credit... Adam Kerson, via Storyful

A heckler at a political event is hardly unusual. The woman was no ordinary heckler, though. She was a reporter from China’s state-run international broadcaster, CGTN.