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China was one of the world’s largest jailers of journalists in 2020, continuing a pattern of total state control over the media begun under the ruling “central” leader of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), Xi Jinping.
“China, which arrested several journalists for their coverage of the pandemic, was the world’s worst jailer for the second year in a row,” said the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). in an annual report, which he found authoritative Governments had stepped up arrests of journalists for covering the COVID-19 pandemic.
“In the midst of the pandemic, governments delayed trials, restricted visitors and ignored the increased health risk in the prison; at least two journalists died after contracting the disease while in custody,” the group said in a report. Posted on December 15.
And in Paris, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) said Beijing “has not learned the lessons of the coronavirus and has toughened up even more.[ed] censorship “during 2020.
“China languishes near the end of the [Global Press Freedom] Index and does not seem willing to learn the lessons of the coronavirus pandemic, the spread of which was facilitated by censorship and pressure on whistleblowers, “the group said.
“Worse still, Beijing has used the crisis to further tighten its grip on the media, banning the publication of any report that questions how it has been handled,” RSF said.
He said that full control over the media was made much easier due to the CCP’s control of media organizations, regardless of whether they are privately owned or run by the state.
“President Xi Jinping has succeeded in imposing a social model based on the control of news and information and the surveillance of citizens,” RSF said.
He said that more than 100 journalists and bloggers are currently behind bars in China.
“Some [are] detained in life-threatening conditions, “he said, adding that at least three journalists and three political commentators had been arrested in connection with the pandemic.
“The repression against foreign correspondents has tightened and 16 have been expelled since the beginning of the year,” he said.
Many currently held
Independent video journalist Zhang Zhan, who is being held in Shanghai’s Pudong district after reporting on the coronavirus pandemic from the central city of Wuhan, was among those listed in CPJ’s database of targeted journalists.
Zhang’s defense attorney was informed on Wednesday that his trial for “sparking fights and causing trouble,” a charge frequently used by the CCP to attack peaceful critics of the government, will take place on December 28, according to a copy of the notice. letter posted on Twitter.
Also listed are Cai Wei, Chen Mei and Tang Hongbo, detained on the same charge after they created an online database of information related to the pandemic from collective sources called Terminus 2049.
Terminus 2049 collected and archived news censored by Chinese authorities on social media platforms and major media outlets, according to Terminus 2049 Watch, a website run by Chen’s brother Chen Kun, CPJ said.
The site had re-posted censored articles on alleged sexual harassment at Chinese universities, the suicide of a student who was bullied by his professor and the Chinese authorities’ campaign to evict migrant workers from Beijing, he said.
Increasing control
Hong Kong Journalists Association (HKJA) Chairman Chris Yeung said the pandemic was actually a pretext for the CCP’s increasing control of all forms of public information and speech.
“On the surface it appears to be related to the pandemic, because authorities will be particularly nervous [about that]”Yeung said.
But he said Beijing’s strategy of “comprehensive control over information” was already in place before the first COVID-19 cases emerged in Wuhan in late 2019.
However, he said more journalists may have been attacked in 2020, amid the “minefield” of information controls installed to prevent social unrest or chaos during city-wide closures and restrictions caused by the pandemic. .
Yeung said he also hopes to see a crackdown on journalism in Hong Kong, which once boasted a free and vibrant publishing and media industry, amid a crackdown on dissent under an imposed national security law. to the city by Beijing.
“There is a much higher level of risk now that the national security law has come into effect, because the provisions are broad and loosely worded,” Yeung told RFA, citing recent charges against pro-democracy media mogul Jimmy Lai for “collusion with powers”, based on social media posts and meetings with officials abroad.
Yeung said the recent arrest of Bloomberg journalist Haze Fan in Beijing on suspicion of “endangering state security” was also cause for concern and could herald further arrests of journalists.
CPJ called for Fan’s immediate release.
“The accusations by the Chinese authorities that Haze Fan participated in criminal activities that endanger China’s national security have no credibility,” the group’s Asia program coordinator Steven Butler said in a December 11 statement.
“Fan should be released immediately and China should stop harassing foreign news bureaus operating in the country,” Butler said.
Reported by Lin Peiyu for the RFA Mandarin Service and by Chan Chun-ho for the Cantonese Service. Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.
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