0:00

You're listening to our Mama

0:02

Mia podcast. Mama

0:04

Mia acknowledges the traditional owners of land

0:07

and waters that this podcast is recorded

0:09

on. Hello, Gemma here from

0:11

True Crime Conversations. And this week, as

0:13

we continue with our summer content, we're

0:16

bringing you Mama Mia's investigation into

0:18

the disappearance of Peng Shui. Our

0:21

Extraordinary Stories team looked at how

0:23

a beloved Chinese tennis player shared

0:25

details of an affair and sexual

0:28

assault involving one of China's highest

0:30

ranking political figures before vanishing. We'll

0:33

be back soon with fresh episodes exploring

0:35

the world's most notorious crimes with the

0:38

people who know the most about them.

0:40

In the meantime, please enjoy part

0:43

one of our three-part investigation into

0:45

Peng Shui. It

0:51

was after 10pm on November 2nd, 2021

0:53

when 35-year-old Peng Shui, three-time Olympian and

0:58

China's beloved global tennis star, sat

1:01

down and began pounding the keys

1:03

of her laptop. The

1:05

characters poured out of her, anger

1:08

and sadness clear in the words she wrote,

1:11

truncated sentences of an open

1:13

letter slash pseudo essay detailing

1:15

an affair and sexual assault

1:17

involving one of China's highest

1:19

ranking political figures. Peng

1:48

Shui hit send, uploading her

1:50

explosive story on the popular Chinese

1:52

social media site Weibo to her

1:54

half a million followers and a

1:57

community of millions more. rocked

4:00

the tennis community and human rights

4:02

advocates the world over. If

4:05

the challenge can tell us what to do, we have to do it.

4:08

I'm Emma Gillespie and this is

4:10

Extraordinary Stories. Take

4:19

it over. It's the 2018

4:22

Australian Open at Melbourne Park. Kang

4:24

Shui is the most recognised tennis player

4:27

ever to come out of China. I

4:30

love tennis, I want to be on the

4:32

court and I swear, it's fine. I

4:34

just want to be happy on the court. This

4:37

is her. She's in a promotional shoot

4:39

for the Oz Open. Can you

4:41

please look at the camera? OK. And

4:43

just say happy. Is that the

4:45

word? Happy. She had plenty

4:48

of things to be happy about. Back

4:50

then, Kang Shui was China's number one.

4:53

And she was ranked 27th in the world, about

4:57

to make it into the Grand Slam doubles

4:59

final. Oh,

5:04

Tina. She narrowly missed

5:06

out on Grand Slam glory. But

5:09

as her doubles partner from the year before, Andrea

5:11

Laskova told 60 Minutes recently,

5:14

Pang was a force on and off the

5:16

court. She would finish her singles, she would

5:19

go play doubles and then she would go

5:21

for two, three hours more for practice. And

5:24

back again. Like,

5:27

I'm not kidding. It was crazy. She

5:29

sounds so driven, so, so determined. Yes,

5:32

absolutely. She's

5:35

the top tennis star. She

5:39

used to be the number one in women's

5:41

doubles. I mean, tennis isn't that

5:44

popular in China, but it has gained

5:47

more than popularity over the

5:49

years. But China hasn't produced

5:51

like number one tennis star,

5:53

like in the US or in Australia.

5:57

So, I mean, for her to achieve number one

5:59

in women's doubles. That's human rights advocate Yacu

6:01

Wang. We'll

6:05

hear more from her soon. While

6:07

Peng was a formidable athlete on the

6:10

court, there was something different about her

6:12

off it. A certain

6:14

independence and drive. These

6:16

are both characteristics to be made in

6:18

any athlete, right? But

6:21

why is it different in China? Why

6:23

is it dangerous? Here

6:27

in Australia, we celebrate the bravery of

6:29

women like Maddy Groves, the Aussie swimmer

6:31

who accused swimming Australia of fostering a

6:34

culture of misogyny, one where she claims

6:36

she was molested by a person who

6:38

still works in the sport. It

6:41

really doesn't feel like much has changed since

6:43

I was growing up. It just

6:45

really seems like there is this vicious

6:48

cycle of, I guess,

6:50

using and abusing female athletes until

6:52

they're burnt out and broken. And

6:55

as far as our sports men

6:57

with fiery personalities, take

6:59

Nick Kirios, a man

7:01

who has built an entire public image

7:04

off the back of being criticised for

7:06

having an entitled attitude. And

7:08

yet when he's winning, we love him. Yeah,

7:10

I guess it's just the culture of tennis. You know,

7:13

it's supposed to be a nice white gentleman sport, you

7:15

know? So seeing someone called myself go out there, be

7:17

different and be successful, it's not so easy to say

7:19

at times. But for an athlete

7:21

in China expressing yourself in the way

7:23

and Maddy Groves or a Nick Kirios might,

7:26

it's just not an option. Matthew

7:30

Futterman is a veteran sports reporter with the

7:33

New York Times. He told

7:35

the Daily Podcast last year that before Peng

7:37

revealed her secret on Weibo, she

7:39

was an important asset in the Chinese

7:41

Communist Party agenda. She's

7:44

born in 1986 in Hunan

7:46

Province, begins to play tennis

7:49

as a young girl, and

7:52

she shows some promise. And

7:54

what I think is important about her

7:57

story is that she

7:59

is born sort of right in the

8:01

sweet spot of where

8:03

China is in terms of trying

8:05

to establish itself in

8:08

mainstream sports. There are certain

8:11

sports that China has been very good at for

8:13

a very long time, most notably table tennis, but

8:17

in the 1990s, China sort

8:19

of decides that it wants to use sports

8:22

to establish itself as

8:24

a really sort of well-rounded

8:27

world power. Heng

8:29

Shui was everything Chinese government officials

8:32

had longed to discover, a

8:34

child prodigy developed at a national sports

8:36

school from a young age. This

8:39

was a woman who would bring tennis to

8:41

China and who'd show the

8:43

world that her home country was producing

8:45

serious athletes. She starts winning

8:47

some tournaments and winning some matches in the

8:49

early 2000s and begins to

8:53

establish herself in the later 2000s

8:56

as someone who can play with the

8:58

best players in the world. And that

9:00

really climaxes in 2013 when

9:04

playing with her Taiwanese doubles

9:06

partner, Zai Xu Wei. She

9:09

wins the Wimbledon

9:12

doubles championship. The next year she

9:14

wins the French open

9:16

doubles championship and she actually even makes the

9:19

US open singles semi-finals

9:21

that year as well. In

9:24

a few years, China's golden goal of

9:26

tennis would land her country and her

9:28

sport in the spotlight for different reasons.

9:31

Peng Shui condemning her future by

9:33

daring to run afoul of her government's

9:36

agenda. Here's what

9:38

the Women's Tennis Association CEO Steve Simon

9:40

had to say about her recently. We

9:42

have a woman who

9:44

has had the courage

9:46

to step up and reflect

9:49

some significant allegations of

9:51

sexual assault and harassment

9:54

against a very high

9:56

level political official within

9:58

China. Pang's impressive

10:00

feats at Grand Slams, the world

10:03

over. Many of us hadn't

10:05

really heard of her before that infamous

10:07

Weibo post in 2021. Pang

10:10

Shui posted on social media the details

10:12

of an alleged forced affair with and

10:14

sexual assault by the former Vice Premier

10:16

of China. Now she's missing and

10:19

the loudest voices in the tennis world are

10:21

calling for answers. Honestly it's shocking. Someone

10:24

that I've seen on the tour in

10:26

the previous years quite a few times.

10:28

I can't think of anything like this

10:30

ever happening before. Everything about

10:32

this story just screams out trouble.

10:34

It screams out something's wrong. Naomi

10:36

Osaka joining the chorus of worried

10:39

athletes now putting pressure on the

10:41

Chinese government tweeting, censorship is never

10:43

okay at any cost. I hope

10:45

Pang Shui and her family are

10:47

safe and okay. I'm in

10:49

shock of the current situation and I'm

10:52

sending love and light her way. Fast

10:54

forward to 2022 and Pang Shui's

10:56

post on Weibo has long since

10:59

vanished. The Chinese Communist

11:01

Party censorship machine moved swiftly

11:03

to remove not only her original

11:05

essay but all trace of

11:07

her claims and any

11:09

conversation it may have inspired. During

11:12

that 30 minutes, people were

11:14

fiercely discussing it. 30 minutes

11:16

later, the censorship came. You

11:19

can't feel it. Things

11:21

are being deleted. You

11:23

want to post her name. You want to

11:25

post Zhang Gao's name. You could not

11:27

be posted. Then in

11:30

the few days after that, even

11:32

words like tennis have been censored. But

11:34

people still have memory because it was

11:36

fiercely discussed within 30 minutes. So people

11:39

start to invent new ways to talk

11:41

about this issue without mentioning their names

11:44

without mentioning tennis. Yacu Wang is a

11:46

human rights advocate living and working in

11:48

New York City as a senior researcher

11:50

for Human Rights Watch. She

11:53

explains. there,

14:00

you created this gigantic Chinese Amazon. If the

14:02

Chinese government tells you what to do, you

14:04

have to do it. So,

14:06

you know, in a lot of ways,

14:08

just as long as

14:10

you are a citizen in China, you live in

14:13

China, you don't have the

14:15

freedom of speech, you don't have the

14:17

freedom of movement, you cannot protest, you

14:19

know, your property are

14:21

not really guaranteed, you know,

14:24

in all kinds of ways, the government

14:26

just has so much power over you.

14:29

With that power comes harsh

14:31

censorship of Chinese citizens, particularly

14:34

across media and the online

14:36

space. The version

14:38

of the internet Chinese people have

14:40

access to isn't the same as

14:42

the far-reaching, infinite and immense web

14:44

URI use. While every

14:46

tech company, whether in the US or

14:49

China, have to moderate their content to

14:51

some extent, be that for things like

14:53

pornography or violence. Yacu says

14:56

the moderation in China extends to

14:58

removing any and all content that

15:00

is critical of the Chinese Communist

15:02

Party. And they hire tens

15:05

of thousands of content moderators

15:07

just to focus on

15:10

that kind of content. And

15:13

usually the companies do it themselves because in

15:15

order to stay in business,

15:18

in order to not be cracked down,

15:20

not be closed down, they have to

15:22

hire those people and do this kind

15:24

of content moderation. And, you

15:28

know, oftentimes the government to give them

15:30

directives, like big guidelines, these are the

15:32

things you have to censor, then they

15:34

need to figure out the specifics, how

15:37

do I censor my own platform

15:39

to make sure that I don't provoke the

15:41

wrath of the government. Yacu says

15:43

the government in China even send

15:45

their own police officers to be

15:48

stationed within social media companies, like

15:50

part of the company's internal staff, on

15:53

the ground as a physical presence

15:56

to intimidate companies into compliance. So

15:58

there's this direct and more. monitoring by

16:01

the government. There's very close,

16:03

I would say, cooperation between the

16:05

government and social media content. So

16:09

social media companies can

16:12

be in good terms of the government as they're in

16:14

business. And instead of

16:16

Facebook or Instagram, there's a

16:18

platform called Weibo. Yacu

16:21

Wang says it's kind of like Twitter

16:24

and it used to be a rare

16:26

space where activism could flourish in some

16:28

way. The Chinese company invented

16:30

their own kind of similar to Twitter

16:32

because Twitter was shut down. So Chinese

16:35

people inside the Chinese, they're all migrated

16:37

to Weibo because Twitter is gone.

16:40

And initially, I would say, in the early

16:43

2010s, Weibo was really a place

16:45

that people discussed about social issues.

16:48

There is always restrictions. You

16:51

cannot say anything about the Tiananmen massacre.

16:54

You can now criticize the president. People

16:57

know that. But beyond that, there are still a

16:59

lot of things you can discuss, like

17:01

local corruption, environmental

17:03

issues, women's rights,

17:06

domestic violence. Those are social issues.

17:09

People all discuss seriously on the platform.

17:12

For some activists,

17:14

they would have, let's say, 20

17:16

million followers. And they're all

17:18

very keen about discussing those issues. Weibo

17:21

is used by millions of Chinese

17:23

people. But the way it's

17:25

used has shifted over the past decade. And

17:28

today, it's more strictly monitored and

17:30

moderated by government officials than ever.

17:33

In 2013, there were

17:36

major crackdowns against the

17:38

activist type. Then they

17:41

were detained in prison. Then over

17:44

the years after 2013, just

17:46

the censorship on the platform got

17:48

worse and worse. It

17:51

used to be you can discuss

17:53

local corruption, environmental protests. All those

17:55

were censored. I

17:58

would say today, the platform is very, very, very important. is much

18:00

more focused on entertainment than

18:03

the governance propaganda is

18:05

much heavier on that platform. I think

18:07

for a lot of people who

18:09

are, they care about social justice

18:11

issues, they just feel, you know, the

18:13

platform is no longer that useful for

18:16

discussing those issues. So

18:19

what happens to those who do

18:21

speak out against China? Dr.

18:23

Chong-Yi Fang is an Associate Professor

18:25

in China Studies at the University

18:27

of Technology, Sydney. Not

18:30

only is he an expert on the political

18:32

climate in China, he's also someone who's

18:34

experienced detainment at the hands of the

18:36

Chinese government. The academic was

18:38

held and questioned for seven days

18:40

after a three-week research trip in southern

18:42

China in 2017. He

18:45

says Chinese detention is among the

18:47

worst and most notorious in the modern world.

18:50

Here's what he told SBS News about

18:52

his experience behind bars in China. I

18:55

thought it is created to

18:57

deal with political dissident and

18:59

other government officials who

19:01

are put under detention at

19:04

a facility run by

19:06

secret police to extract

19:08

confessions, to establish a case

19:10

against the suspect. In order

19:13

to extract the

19:15

confession, usually

19:17

they apply all forms of

19:20

very secure for delicate torture.

19:23

That facility, it is

19:25

a small cell, 10 square meters

19:27

without window. There's no bed. It's a

19:29

mattress on the floor. And then the

19:32

light is kept on 24 hours, and

19:36

there will be two guards, 24 hours

19:38

around the clock, and then the suspect

19:41

will not be allowed to go outside

19:43

of the room unless

19:45

he or she is subject

19:47

to continuous interrogation.

19:50

Intelligation can last for a whole day.

19:55

What happened to Chong-Yi Fang, Pang Shui

19:58

and countless of other Chinese individuals? individuals

20:00

is what's known as forced

20:02

disappearances. Senior researcher

20:05

at Human Rights Watch, Yau Chi

20:07

Wang, has watched Beijing's long history

20:09

of enforcing these disappearances on

20:12

individuals who dare to disagree with them.

20:14

From political opponents to anyone whose

20:16

views or actions may not align

20:18

with the Chinese Communist Party ideals,

20:21

under the leadership of Xi

20:23

Jinping. This happened before to

20:26

many human rights activists, lawyers,

20:28

business people who somehow got

20:31

into bad blood with the Chinese

20:33

government for criticizing government or somehow

20:35

made the Chinese government unhappy. So they

20:37

usually disappeared. Then they

20:40

reappeared on some TV program saying

20:42

that I confessed to my crime,

20:44

I did something wrong, I'm going

20:47

to reform, things like that. Just

20:50

a year before Peng Shui made

20:52

her post on Weibo, billionaire tech

20:54

guru and founder of Alibaba, think

20:57

of it like China's version of Amazon, Jack

20:59

Ma vanished for three

21:02

months. After he

21:04

resurfaced, he explained he'd

21:06

been re-educated by the government

21:08

while his company was hit with

21:10

billions of dollars in fines and

21:13

forcibly restructured and scaled down. The

21:15

billionaire founder of China's giant online

21:17

retailer Alibaba has not been

21:19

seen in public since October. He

21:21

is very powerful, very wealthy and

21:24

generally a very public figure. But

21:26

since giving this speech that was

21:29

critical of China's government, Jack Ma

21:31

hasn't been seen in public and

21:33

now many are questioning, where is

21:35

Jack Ma? This long

21:38

line of forced disappearances that preceded

21:40

Peng Shui's allegations meant she

21:42

knew exactly what was at risk on

21:45

that November night when she took to Weibo.

21:48

And even knowing all of those potential risks,

21:51

her truth still mattered more to her.

21:54

Peng Shui accused Zhang Gao-li of forcing

21:56

her to have sex with him. was

22:00

one of the members of

22:02

the Standing Politburo Committee. The

22:05

seven member committee,

22:08

Politburo, is

22:10

the highest governing body of the

22:12

Chinese Communist Party system. And

22:16

interestingly, he was also the

22:18

person who was responsible for

22:20

the 2022 Beijing Olympic Games. The

22:24

Politburo of the Chinese Communist Party

22:26

is the decision-making body of the

22:28

Chinese government. A man like Zhang

22:30

Gao Li or anyone within that

22:32

committee is considered

22:34

completely untouchable. You

22:36

don't hear their stories at

22:38

all. You don't hear about

22:41

their personal lives at all. Everything

22:43

about them is carefully managed.

22:45

Anything you hear about them

22:49

is done by the Chinese government

22:51

propaganda machine. There's no way a

22:54

random person can talk

22:56

to such a high-level

22:58

official without the government being able to

23:00

manage the situation. On

23:03

the 2nd of November, 2021, Peng

23:06

Shuai made a decision that would shock

23:08

the Chinese government, its people and

23:10

the world, when she finally

23:13

revealed a long-coked secret. She

23:15

accused China's former vice-premier Zhang Gao

23:17

Li of sexually assaulting her in

23:20

his home with his wife

23:22

and at least one other person also in

23:24

the house. I have no proof,

23:26

and it would be impossible for me to

23:28

keep any evidence. You denied

23:31

everything afterwards, but it is true that

23:33

you liked me first, or otherwise I

23:35

wouldn't have had a way to come

23:37

into contact with you. This

23:39

is the same disappearing act as seven years

23:42

ago, getting rid of me after

23:44

you're done playing with me. You

23:46

said there were no transactions between us. That's

23:49

true with all the feelings and money between

23:51

us, it had nothing to do with power

23:53

and wealth. But I have nowhere

23:55

to leave my feelings. It's very

23:57

hard to face. I Know that for some-

24:00

The. Premier. Li

24:02

you said that you're not afraid, but

24:04

even it's exciting the stone with an

24:07

egg and causing self destruction like a

24:09

month to the flames. Are

24:11

whole called the Truth about. You're in

24:13

a long see. An emotional post

24:16

on claimed the pod sustained in

24:18

inclement. Know for for the better part

24:20

of a decade C D how how

24:22

one of China's most powerful officials had

24:25

use as a sex. And

24:27

then essentially posted her the

24:29

contents of that hosts. It

24:31

was at a very you

24:33

know like meticulously structure into.

24:36

A story that he is

24:38

so well told. It was

24:41

more and outbursts of anger

24:43

and sadness and frustration. So

24:45

when you read it you

24:47

can sense. The authenticity.

24:49

You know she felt hurt. She

24:51

felt wrong. But. Punks? Why

24:53

had credibility? People. Instantly

24:56

believes her. Posts. I sell

24:58

Well known. She's famous. the person

25:01

she's. Accused of sexual assaults? Yes Also,

25:03

Bow and now she is one of the

25:05

top. Officials in

25:07

the Chinese political system mean

25:09

it's harder. To get higher than

25:11

he was so in the way

25:14

people would just shocked by such

25:16

a high level official, been accused

25:18

of sexual assault, and by a

25:20

seamless woman. It's. Like you

25:22

know you've been it's just a random

25:24

woman nobody ever heard of in a people

25:27

to suspect the web is one that which

25:29

had something found doing this right but her

25:31

fame a prominent seen china land for an

25:34

instant expected in a t. No

25:37

matter how quickly the Chinese authorities jumped into

25:39

the mix and to clean up the slightest

25:41

mess. He. Would be to light.

25:44

Thanks. To punks wise, international

25:47

prominence and internet of

25:49

course, word spread internationally.

25:51

Swiftly. I. Was in the

25:53

last. It was my night time so I.

25:55

Are I got alerted of the things we

25:57

all as I went to the way born

25:59

checking. People were discussing it seriously.

26:02

Yochu began thinking the worst. At

26:04

that point, I just felt, I

26:07

don't know what is going to happen to her. I

26:09

just felt she's going to disappear. And

26:12

we probably will never hear from her. And

26:15

I don't think she will be able to get out of the country.

26:18

The government will fear that if she is able

26:20

to leave, they can no longer control her. The

26:26

world would hold its breath for three weeks,

26:29

wondering not just where Pangshui was,

26:32

but if she was safe, if she was

26:34

alive. Next time on Extraordinary Stories,

26:37

we investigate the silencing of Pangshui in

26:40

the aftermath of her Weibo post, as

26:43

masses of onlookers from afar nervously

26:45

awaited proof of her safety. But

26:47

even once we were shown a

26:50

seemingly healthy-looking Pangshui, the question

26:52

of her freedom didn't seem to be as simple

26:54

to answer. How

26:56

does a young, prominent woman go from

26:58

finding the strength to write this in

27:00

her powerful open letter? You told me

27:02

you loved me from the beginning to

27:04

end. You have always asked me

27:06

to keep my relationship with you a secret. I

27:09

felt like a walking corpse. I

27:12

was pretending so much every day that

27:14

I didn't know who the real me

27:16

was anymore. To telling Chinese

27:18

and Western media, I

27:21

have never said or written about anyone

27:23

assaulting me. Thanks

27:25

for listening to this episode of Extraordinary Stories.

27:27

It was written and produced by me, Emma

27:29

Gillespie, with Kia Yousij, Sydney Peed and Callie

27:31

Borg. Audio

27:34

production is by Madeline Jolonu. We'll

27:36

see you next time.