Actress Zhang Ziyi and her fiance Vivi Nevo are seen in a file photo. [File Photo: ent.sina.com.cn]

Chinese actress Zhang Ziyi has expressed her resentment over a series of paparazzi photos that show intimate scenes of her and her fiance.

"When she found out about the photos online, she was enraged," an assistant of Zhang surnamed Zhi told the Western China Metropolis Daily on Monday.

A group of 81 photos first emerged during the past weekend on the English-language Website X17online.com, and were spread like wildfire among Chinese Websites thereafter. Some sites even encountered server failure due to an overwhelming number of hits, according to a report on Sina.com.cn.

The photos show scantily-clad Zhang Ziyi and Vivi Nevo sunbathing on a beach. Zhang can be seen topless in several photos. The couple obviously were unaware of the paparazzi and were shown in the photos caressing each other. Sources say the beach was the private property of Zhang's millionaire fiance Nevo.

"It is a matter of personal privacy," Ji Lingling, Zhang's publicist, said in a statement. "Ziyi and her fiance were vacationing on a private beach enjoying a normal part of life," adding the photos were a serious infringement of the couple's privacy.

Ji says the actress is now working to have these photos removed from the Internet, but is yet to consider filing a lawsuit.

The Western China Metropolis Daily cites a Beijing lawyer named Wei Zhen as saying that Zhang could seek legal help to stop commercial Websites from using the photos to attract clicks.

(CRI January 7, 2009)