Lawyers for the Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon actor say she suffered “immense grievance and distress” when the Hong Kong-based tabloid Apple Daily reported in May that she had slept with the disgraced Chinese politician Bo Xilai, the former minister of commerce who was ousted from the Communist party politburo earlier this year, as well as other “high government officials”. The state-backed web portal China.org.cn also reported at the time that the actor was being investigated by the authorities and had been banned from leaving the country.

Zhang denies both sets of allegations and yesterday filed a lawsuit at the high court of Hong Kong seeking unspecified libel damages from Next Media over stories in its publications Apple Daily and Next Magazine. According to the South China Morning Post and the state-owned China News Service, she is also suing an unnamed Chinese language news website in the US that is believed to have been the source of the claims.

Full article of The Guardian here.