"As an illustrator, artist and writer, I feel strongly for Gui Minhai and other imprisoned publishers, writers and artists around the world. We all have a responsibility to stand up for free speech and artistic freedom," says Stina Wirsén in a press release.
In 2015, Gui Minhai was kidnapped in Thailand and taken to China. In 2020, he was sentenced to ten years in prison for “providing intelligence information to a foreign power.” The evidence on which the sentence was based has never been made public. Several publishers say he was imprisoned instead for his work in Hong Kong as a publisher, including publishing literature critical of the regime.
For the sixth year, the publishing industry and the Swedish Publishers Association are holding a digital demonstration, demanding that "the Chinese state respect human rights and that Gui Minhai be released" and urging publishers to share Stina Wirsén's portrait using the hashtag #fängsladeförläggare.