Freedom of Press: January 2008 Archives

By Jim Yardley | The New York Times
30 January 2008

When state security agents burst into his apartment last month, Hu Jia was chatting on Skype, the Internet-based telephone system. Mr. Hu's computer was his most potent tool. He disseminated information about human rights cases, peasant protests and other politically touchy topics even though he often lived under de facto house arrest.

Mr. Hu, 34, and his wife, Zeng Jinyan, are human rights advocates who spent much of 2006 restricted to their apartment in a complex with the unlikely name of Bo Bo Freedom City. She blogged about life under detention, while he videotaped a documentary titled "Prisoner in Freedom City." Their surreal existence seemed to reflect an official uncertainty about how, and whether, to shut them up.

That ended on Dec. 27. Mr. Hu was dragged away on charges of subverting state power while Ms. Zeng was bathing their newborn daughter, Qianci. Telephone and Internet connections to the apartment were severed. Mother and daughter are now under house arrest. Qianci, barely 2 months old, is probably the youngest political prisoner in China.

For human rights advocates and Chinese dissidents, Mr. Hu's detention is the most telling example of what they describe as a broadening crackdown on dissent as Beijing prepares to play host to the Olympic Games in August. In recent months, several dissidents have been jailed, including a former factory worker in northeastern China who collected 10,000 signatures after posting an online petition titled "We Want Human Rights, Not the Olympics."

"This is a coordinated cleansing campaign," said Teng Biao, a legal expert who has known Mr. Hu since 2006. "All the troublemakers -- including potential troublemakers -- are being silenced before the Olympic Games."

With fewer than 200 days before the Aug. 8 opening ceremonies, Beijing is in the full throes of preparations. Roads and subway lines are being completed, and the city's new stadiums are nearly finished. But with more than 20,000 journalists expected for the Games, Beijing is also tightening controls over information.

Early this month, the authorities announced that only state-sanctioned companies would be allowed to broadcast video and audio files on the Internet, although the practical effect of that edict remains unclear. China has also extended a crackdown on Internet pornography and "unhealthy" content, a move some rights groups consider a tool for arresting online dissidents.

China has jailed 51 online dissidents -- more than in any other country -- and last year blocked more than 2,500 Web sites, according to Reporters Without Borders, a press freedom advocacy group.

Mr. Hu used his own Web site to post updates about other dissidents or peasant protests. He also did not hesitate to describe his semi-regular encounters with the police and state security officers assigned to monitor him.

"The police force mobilized is much, much larger than before," Mr. Hu told Agence France-Presse in October as the Communist Party clamped down on dissidents during an important political meeting. "Now, they just arrest people very publicly and arbitrarily, without the necessary legal procedures."

Last year, Mr. Hu became involved in the case of Yang Chunlin, the former factory worker who organized the "We Want Human Rights, Not the Olympics" petition drive, part of an effort to help local farmers seek legal redress over confiscated land. Mr. Yang was arrested last summer and charged with subverting state power, according to human rights groups.

Mr. Hu told Agence France-Presse that Mr. Yang's arrest was part of a government effort to "clean up" politically touchy cases before the Games.

"I'm helping Yang Chunlin to hire a lawyer," Mr. Hu said. "The authorities have threatened Yang's family and relatives. Yang's wife dares not speak to anyone because of the threats."

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By Radio Free Asia
04 January 2008

China's government has issued a stringent new set of rules which will ban all but state-owned corporations from making and uploading video to the Internet.

The new regulations were issued jointly Dec. 31 by the Ministry of Information Industry and the Bureau of Film and Television under China's cabinet, the State Council.

"Companies or individuals who do not have an operating license issued by the relevant department, or who have not submitted an application for such a license, must cease to offer online video services," said the regulations, which come into effect Jan. 31.

The move will make it difficult for Chinese netizens to post video to their blogs or to Web sites, or to Chinese video-sharing sites similar to YouTube, including citizen journalism of the kind which has proliferated amid growing civil unrest across the country.

Industry experts estimate that there are currently around 160 sites offering such services in China, and that the majority of them are private enterprises financed by venture capital. Quite a few of them operate without any kind of license from the government.

"There is only one point to these rules, and that is to step up controls over any possible political dissent that might emerge in China," Shaanxi-based cyberdissident Deng Yongliang told RFA's Mandarin service.

"Now that the standard of living is rising for many people, they are beginning to demand more intellectually as well as materially, and such ideological freedom would be a challenge to the current political system," Deng said.

"We are also about to hold the Olympic Games, and so the authorities will continue to step up controls on freedom of expression."

It is currently possible to see video of incidents of social unrest in China, circulating alongside hard and soft porn, and home movies people make to amuse each other.

In one video uploaded to the popular sharing site 56.com, an ordinary citizen visited Beijing's "Petitioner Village", a now-demolished shantytown once housing hundreds of destitute people who lost everything, and who now spend their lives trying to win redress for grievances against the government.

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The New York Times
January 05, 2008

China has pulled Li Yu's "Lost in Beijing," a movie whose sexually explicit scenes were already censored, from theaters and banned its producer from the film business for two years, The Associated Press reported. The ruling against "Lost in Beijing" accused the filmmakers of publishing unapproved pornographic scenes from the movie on the Internet and on DVDs, the official China News Service Web site reported. The film's producer, Fang Li, said he believed that Chinese officials faced political pressure to act amid the rapid spread of uncensored versions of "Lost in Beijing" and another sexually explicit film, Ang Lee's "Lust, Caution," on the Internet and in pirated DVDs.

By Associated Press | The Straits Times (Singapore)
January 03, 2008

China has decided to restrict the broadcasting of Internet videos - including those posted on video-sharing websites - to sites run by state-controlled companies and require providers to report questionable content to the government.

It wasn't immediately clear how the new rules would affect YouTube and other providers of Internet video that host websites available in China but are based in other countries.

The new regulations, which take effect Jan 31, were approved by both the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television and the Ministry of Information Industry and were described on their websites Tuesday.

Under the new policy, websites that provide video programming or allow users to upload video must obtain government permits and applicants must be either state-owned or state-controlled companies.

The majority of Internet video providers in China are private, according to an explanation of the regulations posted on Chinafilm.com, which is run by the state-run China Film Group.

The policy will ban providers from broadcasting video that involves national secrets, hurts the reputation of China, disrupts social stability or promotes pornography.

Providers will be required to delete and report such content.

'Those who provide Internet video services should insist on serving the people, serve socialism ... and abide by the moral code of socialism,' the rules say.

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