This video shows a Chinese woman alleging harassment in China -- it has nothing to do with Malaysia
- This article is more than one year old.
- Published on August 6, 2019 at 11:30
- 3 min read
- By Rachel YAN,
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The video, posted on July 13, 2019 by Facebook user Rico Hiew here, has been viewed more than 80,000 times and shared more than 1,600 times.
The video shows a woman crying and talking in Chinese to the camera.
The post's Chinese language caption translates to English as:
“See how Malaysia’s security acts
Cheating Chinese people again
Most of the Chinese women
Are tricked into going to Malaysia
They owe a lot of agency fees”
The caption ends with a hashtag saying: “Go and find help at the Chinese embassy.”
Below is a screenshot of the misleading Facebook post:
Hiew also posted the same video in a public Facebook group with more than 1.1 million members here. The post has been shared more than 2,400 times.
The claim in the misleading posts is false; the woman in the video was actually talking about being harassed by a man in China.
Her comments translate to English as: “Everyone in society, I’m begging you, guys, please protect and save me! My name is Pei Xin, and I live in Huashan district, Ma’anshan city, Anhui province.
“Early this year, I was harassed by a man called Guo Yinan. At first he claimed he would come to my house and knock at my door. And now he keeps telling others I’m his girlfriend.
“It happened from January to July this year - a total of six months.
“In February I went to Shatang Police Station (a police station in Huashan district) to report this case, but it was not accepted.
“Today I called Huoli Police Station in Ma’anshan where I live (nearby) for help. The police officer said: ‘Your case has been filed, and we cannot do anything unless he comes to your house with a knife to kill you.’”
Huashan is a district in Ma’anshan city, in China’s eastern Anhui province. Huashan and Ma’anshan are located on a map here.
A keyword search found the video was posted on the woman's Weibo account, but the video and the woman’s Weibo account, @春秋两不沾-, are no longer online. A screenshot of her post -- dated July 11, 2019 -- is still available in this report by Fujian-based radio station FM1036 on July 16, 2019.
Below is a screenshot of the FM1036 report:
The caption of the woman’s Weibo post translates to English as: “Really, after I called the police, the officers did nothing but hang up on me. This man still harasses me constantly; what on earth does he want me to do? Now I’d rather the man would do something to me, or he who hides in the shadows would never be punished. Sina, do you want to continue deleting my videos in seconds?”
“Sina” refers to the China tech firm that owns Weibo, China’s microblogging website.
Police in Huashan district issued a statement on Weibo here on July 16, 2019, about the video and the alleged harassment case.
The first sentence of the police statement says: “Around 4 pm on July 11, Ma’anshan resident Pei posted a video on her Weibo account @春秋两不沾- claiming that she was threatened and harassed by Guo, and the district police station ignored her report.”
The second paragraph of the statement states: “In January this year, Guo bought a bracelet from Pei through WeChat at a price of 1,000 yuan. Guo later believed the bracelet was a counterfeit, and he asked Pei several times for a refund but she refused. The two parties later had a dispute. After investigation, the bracelet sold by Pei was indeed found to be a counterfeit. And Pei’s allegations in the video -- that she was threatened and harassed by Guo and that the police refused to accept her case -- were all fabricated. Her video gained more than 40 million views, causing a very bad social impact.”
The police further said that they gave Pei “criminal coercive measures” for “suspected crimes of provocation, and the case is being investigated further.”
Shortly after the police posted their statement, also on July 16, 2019, Weibo announced they suspended Pei’s Weibo account.
The alleged harassment case was also reported by Chinese media sites such as Beijing News here and China News here.
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