Li Yifeng: China arrests star who played Mao for soliciting prostitutes

One of China’s biggest stars, actor Li Yifeng, continues to be arrested on mistrust of repeatedly taking prostitutes.

State media said Li, 35, had recently been detained and charged by police within Beijing and had opened up his guilt.

The particular actor, who played Communist leader Mao Zedong in a 2021 film, has been decreased as brand ambassador by leading companies including fashion house Prada.

He’s the newest star to be prosecuted in China right after officials criticised the particular influence they have more than young people.

Li Yifeng, also known as Evan Li, is a household name and hugely well-known in China, along with 60 million fans on the country’s Twitter-like Sina Weibo platform. He has been in the public eye since 2007, when he took part in a national TELEVISION talent contest.

Since then, he has made an appearance in many TV shows and dramas before moving into acting. Last year, he or she starred in The Master, a biographical traditional blockbuster about China’s Communist party.

Indicators he was in problems appeared over the weekend, when his name was taken out of the list of celebs due to appear at the Mid-Autumn Festival Gala on state tv on Saturday.

The state China and taiwan Daily said the actor had been “cancelled” right after being placed in management detention on solicitation charges. Striking exactly what some might find as an ironic notice, it reported he had been dropped because promotional ambassador for China’s highest prosecuting agency, which acquired removed a songs video of his from its channel.

Before news associated with his arrest became public, Li’s facility issued a declaration saying he had “always abided by expert ethics, adhered to the moral bottom line and actively shown interpersonal responsibility”.

“The remarks about Li Yifeng on the internet are untrue and have been fabricated and spread maliciously by people with ulterior motives, ” it said. Inside 24 hours, the declaration had been deleted on Sina Weibo.

Despite his large popularity, there has been little apparent sympathy for your actor – probably not surprising, given the type of the crimes he is accused of.

Several netizens talked about exactly how “embarrassing” the case should be for him.

“This is the biggest embarrassment in history! Li Yifeng, you have truly lost face, ” examine one popular Weibo post.

“How dare he create a statement [refuting the allegations], ” another person had written.

Chinese language citizens have heard solid messages from the specialists in recent years that superstars need to be good part models to young audiences, without a single pimple on their records.

Last year, Beijing’s best media regulator sent a strong warning to celebrities that they required to show more “moral” behaviour and “consciously oppose decadent suggestions of money worship, hedonism and extreme individualism”.

Consequently, a lot of celebrities have found themselves “cancelled”, whereby their particular online accounts are removed and their historic works are taken out of prominent channels.

These include actress Zheng Shuang , social media influencer Viya plus Chinese-Canadian actor Kris Wu .

Many in China have got compared the arrest of Mr Li to that of Mister Wu in Come july 1st 2021 for suspected rape. The Every China Women’s Federation has said such scams are “not remote cases in the amusement industry” and that they “shatter the public’s goodwill”.

News of Li Yifeng’s arrest arrives amid an environment of anger regarding the ill-treatment of women within China, including the unprovoked strike on a group of females in a restaurant earlier this year.