University Of Minnesota Student Jailed In China Over Tweets 'Denigrating National Leader’s Image'

A Chinese youth studying at the University of Minnesota was sentenced to six months imprisonment in his home country for tweeting images that unfavorably portrayed a "national leader." The accused was in the United States when he posted the tweets.

According to court documents obtained by Axios on Wednesday, the student, identified as 20-year-old Luo Daiqing, was detained in July 2019 after he had returned to Wuhan, his hometown, at the end of the spring semester.

The documents mentioned that Daiqing had used his Twitter account to post “more than 40 comments denigrating a national leader’s image and indecent pictures” which “created a negative social impact”.

According to Axios, the student allegedly retweeted several images of Winnie the Poo, a cartoon character that was censored in China, and posted images of Lawrence Limburger, another cartoon character that bears a resemblance to Chinese President Xi Jinping.

After being detained for months, the student was sentenced to six months in prison for "provocation" in November 2019. The sentence included the time he had spent in detention.

Ben Sasse, a member of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, issued a statement about the arrest of the student Wednesday night. He condemned the detention of the student and called for his immediate release.

“The Chinese Communist Party ought to release Luo Daiqing immediately, and the University of Minnesota ought to give him a full-ride scholarship. Don't forget that the Chinese Communist Party has banned Twitter, so the only people who even saw these tweets were the goons charged with monitoring Chinese citizens while they're enjoying freedom here in the United States. This is what ruthless and paranoid totalitarianism looks like,” the statement read.

Meanwhile, the University of Minnesota said it was aware of the situation but had no additional information at the time.