The Bejing Olympics are developing into something quite different from a sporting event. These two articles reveal a China that is neither flattering nor worthy of hosting the Olympics. First, AP News covers how goon squads and intimidation techniques being used on reporters:
Harassed Over Tibet Coverage
CHRISTOPHER BODEEN, AP Ne
ws, Apr 07, 2008
Western reporters in China have received harassing phone calls, e-mails and text messages, some with death threats, supposedly from ordinary Chinese complaining about alleged bias in coverage of recent anti-Chinese protests in Tibet.
The harassment began two weeks ago and was largely targeted at foreign television broadcasters, CNN in particular. But the campaign broadened in recent days after the mobile phone numbers and other contact information for reporters from The Associated Press, The Wall Street Journal and USA Today were posted on several Web sites, including a military affairs chat site.
[...] Spokesmen for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the government's State Council Information Office and the national police ministry did not respond to telephone calls and faxed questions Monday seeking comment about the threats.
[...] The complaints against foreign media come just four months before 30,000 journalists from around the world come to Beijing for an Olympics meant to feature a more open, modern China.
[...] Contact information for reporters from the AP, Wall Street Journal and USA Today was posted online after they were among a group of foreign media taken by the Chinese government to Lhasa to report on conditions two weeks after the violent protests.
The Web sites listed the reporters as those who "fabricated untrue news about Tibet." Neither the Web sites nor government officials have cited specific criticisms about the reports.
This one is from Reporters Without Borders' Annual Report on China:
China - Annual report 2008
Area: 9,598,050 sq. km.
Population: 1,315,844,000.
Language: Mandarin.
Head of state: Hu Jintao.
An icy blast blew on press freedom in China ahead of the 17th Communist Party Congress in Beijing in October. Journalists were forced to put out official propaganda, while cyber-censors stalked the Net. Despite the introduction of more favourable rules in January, nearly 180 foreign press correspondents were arrested or harassed in 2007.
Reporters Without Borders representatives met for the first time Chinese officials in Beijing at the start of the year, including the deputy information minister. The authorities said they were ready to reconsider the cases of journalists and Internet-users currently in prison, including Zhao Yan, who worked for the New York Times and was sentenced to three years in prison on the basis of false accusations. But they did not keep their promises. Zhao Yan was released in September having served his full sentence. And all the other promises came to nothing. At the end of the year, the authorities refused to grant visas to five representatives of Reporters Without Borders who wanted t
o travel to Beijing.
[...] Police began arresting dissidents and bloggers calling for improved human rights ahead of the staging of the Olympics. The best known of these “Olympics’ prisoners” is rights activist, Hu Jia, who was arrested at his Beijing home on 27 December. Police produced an arrest warrant accusing him of “inciting subversion of state power”. His wife, the blogger, Zeng Jinyan, and their young daughter got their home surrounded by scores of police. The couple are activists for the environment and the rights of Aids patients and political prisoners and were pushing at the limits of free expression in China by posting sensitive news on their blogs.
Chinese contributors to foreign-based news websites also found themselves singled out for harassment. At least three contributors to US-based news site Boxun are currently in prison. Police arrested one Boxun correspondent Sun Lin, also known under the pen-name Jie Mu, in Nanjing, eastern China on 30 May 2007 after he exposed abuse of power, including in videos posted on the site. Another regular Boxun correspondent, Huang Jinqiu, has been in prison since 2003 after being sentenced to 12 years for “subversion of state power” in eastern Jiangsu province. And in August 2007, cyber-dissident and blogger He Weihua was forcibly admitted to a psychiatric hospital in Hunan in southern China. His family said it was linked to articles published on his blog www.boxun.com/hero/hewh/. Before being released in February 2008, Li Changqing, who had written several articles for the same US-based site, was jailed for three years by a court in Fuzhou, Fujian province in the south-east for circulating “alarmist news”.
http://www.rsf.org/article.php3?id_article=25650
April 9, 2008
Tibet Repression Affects Journalists
March 13, 2008
The 49th Anniversary of Resistance
China admits Tibet monk protests
Chinese officials have acknowledged that Buddhist monks were protesting in the Tibetan city of Lha
sa this week.
Unconfirmed reports earlier this week said as many as 600 monks had taken part in rallies, and that police used tear gas to disperse them.
Rights groups said the demonstrations were the biggest display of opposition to Chinese rule in Tibet since 1989.
US-based Radio Free Asia reported on Tuesday that dozens of monks had been detained as the authorities sought to crack down on dissent.
[...] Radio Free Asia reported that a number of monks were arrested on Monday after a march marking the 49th anniversary of a Tibetan uprising against Chinese rule.
[...] Matt Whitticase from the UK-based Free Tibet Campaign said protesters in Lhasa had been "emboldened" by the support they were receiving from across the world.
"Tibetans inside Tibet are aware that Tibetans in India are marching towards the Tibet border," he said.
Tibetan exiles in India began a march to the border with China on Monday - one of several events protesting against the Beijing Olympics and campaigning for an independent Tibet.
But Indian police arrested more than 100 of the exiles, saying their march breached an agreement between Delhi and the Tibet's India-based government-in-exile, headed by the province's spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama.
[...] Beijing claims sovereignty over Tibet, but many Tibetans remain loyal to the Dalai Lama, who fled in 1959 and currently lives in exile in India.
Help Them Reach Their Motherland
Tibetan protests ripple across mountain region
Thu Mar 13, 2008 5:24am EDT
By Benjamin Kang Lim
BEIJING (Reuters) - The biggest protests by Tibetan monks in nearly two decades have rippled into Chinese provinces populated by Tibetans, as the government's tough response draws condemnation from international groups.
The demonstrations over past days have followed marches around the world to mark the 49th anniversary of an uprising against Communist rule in the remote, mountainous region that has become a focus for protest ahead of this year's Beijing Olympics.
"The reports of protests outside Lhasa show that Tibetans know the eyes of the world are upon them and are determined not to let the momentum drop," Matt Whitticase of the London-based Free Tibet Campaign told Reuters.
On Monday, 500 monks from Drepung monastery defied authorities by staging a rare march in the Tibetan capital of Lhasa, an act that the Chinese government called "an illegal activity that threatened social stability".
About 2,000 Chinese security personnel fired tear gas to try to disperse 600 monks from Sera monastery taking part in a second day of street protests in Lhasa, a source told Reuters.
They demanded the release of about a dozen fellow monks from Sera detained this month for waving a Tibetan flag and shouting pro-independence slogans, the source said.
[...] Another rights group said about 400 monks from Lutsang monastery in the northwestern province of Qinghai, known in Tibetan as Amdo, protested on Monday and shouted slogans for their exiled spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, to return.
[...] On Wednesday, China closed the north face of Mount Everest to expeditions until after the Olympic torch ascends the peak in early May. Five Americans, including an ethnic Tibetan, unfurled "Free Tibet" banners on Everest -- known in China by its Tibetan name, Qomalangma -- last year.
[...] "The march will continue and we are determined. Each one us. No one can stop us, we will reach our motherland," said Lobsang Yeshi, chief coordinator for the march.
Additional reporting by Chris Buckley in Beijing and Abhishek Madhukar in Dehra, India; Editing by Nick Macfie and Alex Richardson)
http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSPEK29133420080313