Chinese Checks

According to the New York-based Committee for the Protection of Journalists, China had the highest number of imprisoned journalists in the world for the sixth year running in 2004. At least 42 reporters are known to be behind bars in the mainland.

Last week, Chinese authorities accused Ching of spying after having held him in detention for more than a month. No evidence to back up the charges has been revealed, however, nor has it been indicated whom he ostensibly spied for.

Ching8217;s wife has said that the spying charges are merely an excuse. She claims the real reason for his arrest lies in attempts Ching was making to get hold of the transcripts of an interview former Communist Party chief Zhao Ziyang gave before he died earlier this year.

Zhao was deposed for refusing to back the use of force against students during the Tiananmen Square demonstrations in 1989 and had been under house arrest until his death. Ching8217;s arrest is the third such case in eight months.

In September last year, New York Times researcher Zhao Yan was detained on the grounds of revealing unspecified state secrets. The arrest followed a report by the newspaper, which proved correct, that former Chinese President Jiang Zemin was retiring from politics.

Zhao continues to be held without trial. Last week, his lawyer announced that Beijing now plans to accuse Zhao of fraud as well, which would enable authorities to gain seven more months before charges must be filed.

In April, another Chinese journalist Shi Tao was sentenced to 10 years in prison after being found guilty of providing state secrets to foreign organisations. Once again the nature of these secrets were not made public.

According to human rights groups, charging journalists under state-secret provisions, which can carry a death penalty, is meant to send out a strong signal to reporters not to stick their nose into what the authorities consider off-limits.

8216;8216;In China we have a saying: 8216;Kill the rooster to scare the monkey,8217;8217;8217; says one journalist who works for a Beijing-based newspaper. 8216;8216;They the authorities are making it clear to reporters not to try and dig up too much information and to stay away from foreign media,8217;8217; she explains.

When China8217;s new leaders, President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao came to power in late 2002, there were some hopes that a relaxing of controls over the media might follow. These hopes have patently been dashed. In fact, the over 150,000 domestic reporters in China are under increasing pressures and restrictions.

Journalists say that the propaganda ministry continues to issue detailed orders about topics that are off-limits to the media, including the Tiananmen massacre, the Cultural Revolution period, the Falun Gong spiritual group, riots in the countryside and more recently the escalating tensions between China and Japan.

Even the new media do not escape censorship. Over 50,000 individuals in China spend their entire day monitoring traffic on the Internet. Access to major news sites such as the BBC and Voice of America is blocked. Blogs, discussion forums and bulletin boards have all been targeted through various measures of state control. Individuals identified for 8216;8216;seditious8217;8217; online activity are arrested, as was the case with Zhang Shenqi, a student who publicly supported the Catholic Church which is banned in China online.

Analysts say the reason for Beijing8217;s tightening of media controls lies in increasing social turmoil. China8217;s economic reforms may have brought prosperity to a few, but millions have suffered as a result. Over 25 million workers, for example, have been laid off in the last few years, following the restructuring of state-owned enterprises. China now has one of the largest gaps between rich and poor in the world.

Thus, although China may present a modern and confident face to the world, serious social tensions simmer under the surface, made all the more dangerous by the lack of any official mechanism to express discontentment or dissent.