(LONDON, July 7, 2026)—Chinese authorities released Pastor Ezra Jin, founder of Zion Church, last week and allowed him to travel to the United States to reunite with his family on July 3. The authorities should now immediately and unconditionally release all remaining detained Zion Church leaders and members, said Fortify Rights today.

“Pastor Jin’s release is long overdue, but it should not be an isolated concession,” said Benedict Rogers, Senior Director at Fortify Rights. “Chinese authorities should immediately and unconditionally release all remaining detained Zion Church leaders, members, and all other prisoners of conscience, and respect the right to freedom of religion or belief for all.”

Pastor Jin was arrested at his home in Beihai, Guangxi Province, on the evening of October 10, 2025. The arrest took place amid a nationwide crackdown on Zion Church, one of China’s largest “unregistered” Protestant churches, during which 27 other Zion Church pastors and church members were detained, including many whose detention was initially kept secret. At least eight remain in detention today, including Pastor Gao Yingjia, Pastor Wang Lin, Pastor Yin Huibin, Pastor Lin Shucheng, Pastor Liu Zhenbin, Pastor Wang Cong, Elder Wang Zhong, and Ms. Wu Qiuyu. Pastor Jin spent almost nine months in detention with no contact with his family and the outside world.

In November 2025, Fortify Rights documented the arbitrary arrest and detention of Pastor Ezra Jin and dozens of other Zion Church pastors and members in a nationwide crackdown on religious freedom in China and called for their release.

In a statement following his release, Pastor Jin’s family said:

Thank you so much for everyone’s support and prayers since the beginning. We truly witnessed a miracle and we are feeling so overwhelmed with joy. We thank God for this tremendous miracle. We also thank President Trump and his administration for their tremendous leadership. We hope this is a signal of a positive turn for people of faith in China and relations between our two nations.

Under international law, the arrest and imprisonment of Zion Church pastors and leaders is a violation of freedom of religion or belief, as set out in Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and Article 18 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. It may also constitute arbitrary detention, with a request for investigation into this violation set out in a submission by the Human Rights Foundation to the U.N. Working Group on Arbitrary Detention on behalf of three of the detained pastors on May 19.

U.S. President Donald Trump raised Pastor Jin’s case with Chinese leader Xi Jinping during his visit to Beijing in May 2026. Furthermore, in October 2025, the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom condemned the nationwide detention of Christian church leaders across China and called on the Chinese authorities to immediately release Pastor Ezra Jin and all other detained church leaders.

Zion Church, founded by Pastor Jin in 2007, has been a target of Chinese authorities for years. Authorities forced the church to close its main Beijing premises in 2018 after it refused to install surveillance cameras, and the church continued through smaller in-person gatherings and online ministry. The October 2025 crackdown against Zion Church is part of a broader campaign by the Chinese Communist Party to control and suppress independent religious communities, said Fortify Rights.

On July 1, 2026, China’s new Law on Promoting Ethnic Unity and Progress entered into force, codifying measures that risk further intensifying the government’s “sinicization of religion” campaign and increasing pressure on ethnic and religious communities across China.

“Pastor Jin’s release is good news, but serious violations of freedom of religion or belief and other human rights continue throughout China, and will likely increase and intensify under the new draconian Ethnic Unity and Progress Law,” said Benedict Rogers. “The Chinese government must release all political and religious prisoners, and repeal repressive laws that undermine and violate basic human rights.”