Li Xin (journalist)

Li Xin (李新) formerly a website editor for a Chinese media group called Southern Metropolis Daily, is a pro-democracy campaigner and rights activist. Li disappeared on a train from Bangkok to the northeastern border town of Nong Khai in Thailand on 11 January 2016 after he leaked confidential documents detailing Communist Party propaganda efforts. About a month later, He Fangmei, Li's wife, said she received a phone call from Li on 3 February, and was told that he had voluntarily come back to Mainland China to meet with investigators.

On 1 January 2016 Li traveled to Thailand. On 9 January, another Chinese activist Yan Bojun, who fled to Thailand in 2015, reported having dinner with Li.

After being forced by China's state security police to spy on other activists, Li decided to flee to New Delhi, India in October 2015. Li's wife, He Fangmei told The Guardian "the [Chinese] authorities said they can arrest him at any time and charge him for endangering state security and for being a spy. He is scared. He couldn’t stay in China any more. He has been trying to get out from China."

In December 2015, Li's wife and infant son were sent back to their hometown in Henan province by authorities in Guangdong province after they were prevented from trying to leave the country via Hong Kong.

Li's disappearance in Thailand is the fourth such instance of Chinese dissidents being captured in the country since October 2015.

On 28 October 2015, two Chinese human rights activists, Dong Guangping and Jiang Yefei were arrested in Bangkok and handed over to Chinese authorities, despite being recognized as refugees by the United Nations.

On 17 October 2015, Gui Minhai, a Chinese-born Swedish publisher who wrote gossip books about Chinese political leaders, disappeared from his apartment in the resort city of Pattaya, Thailand. The incident is widely known as the Causeway Bay Books disappearance. Three months later, he appeared on state-run China Central Television, confessing to his involvement in a fatal car accident in Thailand.

In 2013, Li became a website editor for Southern Metropolis Daily in Guangdong province, where he knew many rights activists and public intellectuals.

After returning to China, in June 2012 Li was detained and interrogated in a hotel for a week by Chinese state security police and was threatened with spying charges if he didn't agree to spy on other activists and dissidents. He was forced to agree to do it, but Li did not provide any essential information.

From 2010 to 2012, Li studied international relations at Jawaharlal Nehru University in India, during which time he was invited to write editorials on Chinese politics by the government of Taiwan.

In 2008, Liu Xiaobo, a Chinese human rights activist and winner of the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize, and others co-authored a manifesto called Charter 08, calling for human rights, freedom of the press and democracy in China. Li was among the 6th group of people who signed the charter.

In 2007, Li set up a website called Civil Society, which advocated for human rights in China.