By Xia Yubing

Fang Jing (Photo: www.chinanews.com.cn)

In response to an outbreak of rumors over her secret identity, China Central Television (CCTV) anchor Fang Jing on Friday denied accusations of being involved in espionage. "So far, I’ve never been questioned by any officials from any division on any issues like that whatsoever," she said.

The rumor was sparked after a professor from Peking University’s blog on Sina.com yesterday accused her of spying. An associate professor from the School of Journalism and Communication, A Yi revealed in his latest blog entry that Fang was actually a spy and had been arrested one month ago. “I’ve never talked to him before [about this],” Fang wrote on her blog on sina.com, “I reserve my right of prosecuting him.”

Fang Jing, born in Beijing, started working for CCTV in 1994 after receiving a postgraduate degree from Communication University of China (the former Beijing Broadcasting Institute). She was at Harvard University in January 2003, as a visiting fellow for 4 months, and rumors of her spy career have carried since then.

As a previous anchor of CCTV's prime-time military program Defense Watch, Fang has not appeared on television for months. Fang’s explanation for her long-absence is related to health issues, but she did not want to go into specific details. She also said she was still a member of CCTV and would go back to work soon again.