Miss Canada Anastasia Lin says China is delaying her visa for the Miss World pageant because of her outspoken views on human rights.

Miss Canada Anastasia Lin says China is delaying her visa for the Miss World pageant because of her outspoken views on human rights.
Photo Credit: Courtesy: Anastasia Lin

Miss Canada slams China for blocking her from Miss World pageant

The Chinese-born Miss Canada, Anastasia Lin, says Chinese authorities are delaying her visa for the Miss World pageant because of her vociferous critique of the country’s human rights record.

Lin, a follower of Falun Gong, a spiritual movement that is banned in China, says she has yet to receive an official invitation for Miss World, taking place on December 19th in Sanya, in southern China.

Without that official invitation Lin says her Chinese visa application cannot be completed. If she doesn’t receive the letter by her departure date on Nov. 20, she will have to drop out of the competition, Lin says.

“As a Canadian citizen I shouldn’t be afraid to speak my mind [and] by rejecting my candidacy, it’s sort of rejecting a whole country’s values,” the 25-year-old actress, told the National Post newspaper.

Outspoken critic

Lin, who came to Canada at the age of 13, has been an outspoken critic of her native country’s suppression of political and religious dissent.

Last week Lin was a guest speaker at an event advocating for religious freedom in China organized by the Henry Jackson Society, a London-based pro-democracy British think tank. In July, she testified before a U.S. congressional committee on Chinese government persecution.

Lin says that as an actress, she also frequently takes on “roles in films and television productions that shed light on official corruption and religious persecution in China, and my Miss World Canada platform reflects these passions. “

As a result, Lin says Chinese officials have launched a campaign of intimidation against her father who still lives in China.

In a blog dated on June 30, 2015, Lin alleges that shortly after she won Miss Canada’s crown, her father started receiving threats from Chinese security agents who complained to him about her human rights advocacy.

“No doubt fearing for his livelihood and business, my father asked me to stop advocating for human rights,” Lin wrote. “He told me that if I did not stop, we would have to go our separate ways.”

Categories: International, Politics, Society
Tags: , , ,

Do you want to report an error or a typo? Click here!

For reasons beyond our control, and for an undetermined period of time, our comment section is now closed. However, our social networks remain open to your contributions.