Japan should release journalists covering Chinese protest
New York, August 16, 2012–Japanese authorities should release two Phoenix TV journalists detained Wednesday while covering Chinese protesters landing on a disputed territory between Japan and China, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.
Propaganda officials miss the boat on ‘China’s Katrina’
Chinese journalists are questioning government propaganda due to conflicting reports of the death toll following Saturday’s devastating flooding in Beijing. Like the Wenzhou train crash and the Sichuan earthquake, the tragedy has galvanized mainstream and online journalists–and the official narrative is crumbling under their scrutiny.
Afghan donors must address media repression
One thing that had better be high on the agenda this weekend at the meeting of 70 or so international aid donors for Afghanistan in Tokyo is the recently released official draft version of the Mass Media Law (a copy of the draft can be found here). I mentioned the new draft in a June…
Chinese writers sentenced for ‘essays of inciting nature’
Chinese activists Lü Jiaping, his wife Yu Junyi, and an associate, Jin Andi, were imprisoned in 2010 without their families being informed. The full details of their 2011 trial and sentences were not made public until 2012, according to the English-language Hong Kong-based South China Morning Post.
Chinese microblog regulates, suspends users–again
Pity those of us who monitor the ups and downs of China’s popular microblog platform, Sina Weibo. For every story its users spread in defiance of local censorship, there follows a clampdown. Whether it’s the latest strike against rumors, or real name registration, or newly banned keywords, there’s always another restriction in the works as…
Chen Guangcheng reporting censored, obstructed
New York, May 3, 2012–Chinese security officials’ ongoing obstruction of foreign and domestic journalists covering dissident Chen Guangcheng is a worrying sign for supporters trying to secure his safety, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. Authorities in Chen’s native Shandong province have kept the blind, self-taught lawyer isolated from the media since September 2010.