(Beijing) An email attributed to Chinese tennis champion Peng Shuai heightened concern Thursday over the fate of the player, who accused a former senior regime official in early November of forcing her to have sex.
The boss of the WTA, which manages the women’s professional tennis circuit, said he doubted official information from China on the champion.
“The statement released today by Chinese state media regarding Peng Shuai only increases my concern for his safety and location,” wrote Steve Simon in a statement released Wednesday evening.
“I find it hard to believe that Peng Shuai actually wrote the email we received and that she could mean the words attributed to her,” he adds.
The Chinese channel CGTN, intended for the international public, unveiled on Twitter on Wednesday evening the screenshot of an email attributed to Peng Shuai, that the Chinese player would have sent to the WTA, without the authenticity of the message being able to be confirmed. .
The English language comments in the originally suspicious message contradict statements made by Peng Shuai, who accused a former deputy prime minister of coercing her into sex three years ago.
“The information, especially concerning the accusation of sexual assault, is false,” said the player in this message. “I am neither missing nor in danger. I was just resting at home, everything is fine. Thanks again for hearing from me ”.
Forced confessions
US player Jessica Pegula tweeted Thursday that she hopes the WTA “continues to show what we stand for as players.” “I hope that more people, and not just tennis players, will shed light on this deeply worrying situation,” she wrote.
The content of the Chinese message has indeed raised doubts as to its authenticity: Twitter users noted that a cursor was visible on the message broadcast by CGTN, a strange phenomenon for a screenshot.
In the past, the Communist regime has been accused of broadcasting forced confessions of suspects on the public media. The same channel CGTN had its license withdrawn in the United Kingdom at the beginning of the year for having broadcast a “confession” attributed to a British citizen arrested in China.
“Peng Shuai’s latest statements, published by public media, should not be taken at face value,” said William Nee, of the China Human Rights Defenders Association.
“The Chinese government has a long experience of arbitrarily detaining people involved in controversial cases, preventing them from speaking freely and forcing them to make public statements,” he said in a statement.
“Incredible courage”
The head of the international organization of women’s tennis observed that Peng Shuai had “shown incredible courage in describing sexual violence which she says she was the victim of by a former senior Chinese leader.” He also claims “independent and verifiable proof” that the player is safe.
“I tried several times to reach her by different means of communication, in vain,” he said, demanding that Peng Shuai “be allowed to speak freely, without coercion or intimidation of any kind. ”
The 35-year-old former world No. 1 doubles social media accuser of former vice-premier Zhang Gaoli, who from 2013 to 2018 was one of China’s seven most powerful politicians , to have forced her to have sex before making her his mistress.
This accusation was briefly posted on November 2 on the player’s official Weibo account (a Chinese equivalent of Twitter). China quickly blocked any reference to this message, which AFP was unable to confirm if it had been written by it.
Since then, the player has not communicated or made a public appearance and Zhang Gaoli has never publicly reacted to the accusations.
Questioned several times, the spokespersons of the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said to ignore everything about this affair and refused to comment, arguing that it was not a diplomatic file.