An Internet writer who posted articles online supporting China's unofficial Christian church has been released after serving a one-year jail term, a fellow activist and a family member said Tuesday.
Computer technician Zhang Shengqi was detained in November 2003 and sentenced to one year in prison last summer after being convicted of leaking state secrets.
He recently returned to his home in eastern China's Shandong province, said Yin Weihong, a veteran Chinese democracy activist in the southeastern city of Wenzhou.
A family member at Zhang's home, contacted by phone, confirmed he was back but said he had gone out.
Zhang and two fellow activists were accused of helping spread information on the Internet about a 2003 crackdown in the eastern city of Hangzhou on independent churches whose followers worship outside the Communist Party-controlled official Protestant church.
Liu Fenggang, Zhang and a third activist, Xu Yonghai, also were found guilty of passing on information to an overseas magazine about a court case involving another member of the independent church.
Liu received a three-year jail sentence and Xu, two years.
China allows worship only in tightly controlled state churches and regards unregistered congregations as subversive channels for foreign infiltration. Those who meet outside the official church are routinely harassed and fined, and sometimes sent to labor camps.
Hundreds of ministers and worshippers were reportedly detained in sweeps by police and dozens of churches destroyed in the Hangzhou crackdown on unregistered churches.
Despite harassment, fines and the possibility of prison, millions of Protestants and Catholics continue to attend unauthorized assemblies, including in private homes.
Officials deny violating religious freedoms, saying detained activists are criminals who violated Chinese law and threatened national security.