The pastor of a prominent underground church in China who was detained last year as part of a crackdown on religious activity was released on Friday, his daughter said, less than two months after President Trump raised his case with China’s leader, Xi Jinping.
The pastor, Jin Mingri, who also goes by the name Ezra, was freed after more than 250 days in custody and allowed to leave for the United States.
Mr. Jin, the pastor and founder of Zion Church, was detained in October and later charged with “illegally using information networks.” After the Chinese authorities shut down the physical headquarters of his church in Beijing in 2018, he moved its operations online, broadcasting sermons on the internet. Those streams were widely popular, reaching an estimated 10,000 people all over China, Mr. Jin’s daughter, Grace Jin Drexel, said.
Mr. Jin was detained as part of a wider campaign against religious groups in China. Several other pastors were similarly taken into custody as Mr. Xi’s government tightened its grip.
Mr. Jin, 57, was one of two non-Americans whose plights were raised by Mr. Trump in May, when he met with Mr. Xi in Beijing. The other was Jimmy Lai, the Hong Kong pro-democracy media tycoon, who is a British citizen. Mr. Trump told reporters then that Mr. Xi had said he would “strongly consider the pastor” but that Mr. Lai’s case was a “tough one.” In February, Mr. Lai was sentenced to 20 years in prison by a Hong Kong court after he was convicted of “conspiracy to collude with foreign forces.”
Ms. Jin Drexel said in a telephone interview on Saturday that she was “very much overjoyed and thankful that this happened.”
