Li Zehua
1995 (age 28–29)
Kcriss Li
Host, YouTuber
July 2013–April 2020
Lǐ Zéhuá
Lǐ Zéhuá
Li3 Zet6 fa4 [li²¹³ t͡sʰɛʔ⁵ fa³⁵]
Journalism[edit]
2020[edit]
During the COVID-19 pandemic in China, he resigned from CCTV and found a way to get into Wuhan, hoping to trace disappeared journalist Chen Qiushi.[2] With the help of locals, he was able to get a car and find a place to stay.[3] In the following days, he used a vlog to report on the pandemic in Wuhan.[2] He disappeared on 26 February 2020,[4] presumed detained by officers from state security.[5][6][7][8] Parts of his chase with the Wuhan authorities was caught on video and uploaded to YouTube.[9] Li was supposedly taken to a police station, where he had fingerprints and blood samples taken, before being taken to an "interrogation room".[9] He was told he was "suspected of disturbing public order", but was told there would be no penalty.[9] Some reports stated that no one had heard from Li since his 26 February 2020, disappearance,[10][11] while others stated that he returned to the hotel on 28 February.[12]
On 22 April 2020, Li posted a video on YouTube, Twitter, and Weibo, and uploaded the English subtitle to YouTube in the following days. According to Li, he was escorted on 26 February to the police station and was under investigation for disrupting public order. Additionally, police detained and quarantined him, citing his visits to sensitive epidemic areas. Li's quarantine was at first in Wuhan, and later moved to his hometown. Li stated that he had been treated well by the police during the detention, and that he had been released on 28 March.[13] According to The Guardian, Li's neutral tone in the video was "very different from his previous videos".[14][15] Activist Ou Biaofeng stated the authorities may have told Li to make the brief statement.[16]
At the end of his April 22 post, he quoted the Book of Documents aphorism, "the mind of man is restless, prone (to err); its affinity to what is right is small. Be discriminating, be uniform (in the pursuit of what is right), that you may sincerely hold fast the Mean." (人心惟危，道心惟微，惟精惟一，允執厥中。)[17] and gave his own interpretation in English: