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The President of the United States, Donald Trump (Image: Reuters)
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) yesterday announced a new regulation, citing what it said was China’s “suppression of press freedom”.
The new rule, effective as of May 11, will restrict visas to Chinese journalists for 90 days and can be extended. Prior to this new rule, such visas were generally unrestricted and did not need to be extended unless the applicant moved to another company or newspaper.
An unidentified DHS official said the new rule would allow the ministry to review Chinese journalists’ visa applications more frequently and would likely reduce the number of Chinese journalists in the United States.
“It also helps better protect national security,” said the official.
The new rule does not apply to journalists with passports from Hong Kong or Macao.
In March, China expelled American journalists from the top three American newspapers, a month after the United States announced that it began to see five Chinese state media operating in the United States as embassies. foreign countries A day later, Beijing deported three journalists from the Wall Street Journal, two Americans and one Australian related to an article that China accused of “racism”.
The movements come amid tensions between the United States and China that are escalating tensions over the Covid-19 pandemic.
In late April, United States President Donald Trump said he believed Covid-19 could originate from a laboratory in China, but provided no evidence. The Wuhan Institute of Virology has denied the allegations, and most experts believe the Covid-19 disease virus originated from a wildlife market in Wuhan.
Anping
According to Reuters
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