Speculation that President Jiang Zemin's appointment of economic reformer
Zhu Rongji as premier in March would quickly lead to political reform was
sadly mistaken. The much-discussed thaw in the chilly climate for free expression
in China that was apparent last year was reversed with a vengeance this year,
especially after U.S. President Bill Clinton's visit in June. And the decision
to sign the U.N. International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights in
October did little to change the climate of free expression in the country.
Activists associated with attempts to form an opposition political party
advocating a free press and other reforms were detained and imprisoned late
in the year. In December, the Department of Propaganda of the Communist Party's
Central Committee began a series of reprisals against independent-minded
newspapers and publishing houses. Cultural Times, an influential
newspaper in Guangzhou, near Hong Kong, was shut down, and senior editorial
staff members of another Guangzhou newspaper, The Hong Kong-Guangzhou
Information Daily, were dismissed. Both foreign and local journalists
faced harassment, censorship, persecution, and expulsion.
China's constitution has long guaranteed freedoms of association and expression
which, in practice, have been over-ridden by other clauses relating to national
security and the primacy of the Communist Party. Journalists report that
while they can cover local corruption and grievances against such low-level
functionaries as police, they receive little support from editors and publishers
of the state-run newspapers when they do so. According to some reporters,
threats from powerful private business interests against journalists who
cover their activities are also growing. Such threats may have given partial
impetus to the creation in August of the Committee for Safeguarding Legal
Rights of Journalists, under the auspices of the state-sanctioned All-China
Journalists Association (ACJA). Official news accounts claimed that the committee
would "protect the rights of the nation's 500,000 journalists." But the lack
of an independent press makes it difficult to believe that such a committee
would do anything to represent the interests of journalists who run afoul
of powerful officials.
In a speech to law enforcement officials in late December, Jiang said the
crackdown was likely to last for at least a year. "Any factors that could
jeopardize our stability must be annihilated in the early stages," Jiang
said, demonstrating the repressive approach to the press that earned him
a place on CPJ's annual list of
the 10 worst Enemies of the Press.
In a rare interview, Li Peng, the chairman of the National People's Congress
(NPC), ruled out democratic reforms in China. Addressing the issue of the
press during the interview with the German newspaper
Handlesblatt, Li, second in the Communist Party hierarchy, said:
"The principle of freedom of the press should be followed, but no individual's
freedom should hinder the freedom of others." Voicing the standard party
line, Li warned that "press freedom should be conducive to national development
and social stability."
In practice, this policy means that journalists have little or no freedom
to discuss political questions that might challenge the national leadership.
In September, for example, Shi Binhai, an editor with the
newspaper China Economic Times, was detained without charges,
leading to speculation that he was punished for co-editing the
book Political China: Facing the Era of Choosing a New Structure,
a compilation of articles by intellectuals and former government officials
on the need for political reform. The publication in August was initially
taken by many as a sign that the range of ideas allowed to be discussed was
broadening, but in November the book was banned. In early January 1999,
authorities suspended the operations of China Today Publishers, the publishing
house that issued Political China, and ordered two of its top editors
to write "self-criticisms" -- the standard ideological punishment in China.
Coverage of dissidents repeatedly sparked the authorities' ire. Two foreign
correspondents -- one Japanese and one German -- were summarily expelled
at different times from the country. Both had had contacts with dissidents.
In September, Natalie Liu, a free-lance CBS News producer working in Beijing,
was arrested at home by police. Liu, a legal resident of the United States
who holds a Chinese passport, was released three days later and allowed to
leave the country. She had helped arrange an interview with former political
prisoner Bao Tong, which aired on CBS the day President Clinton arrived in
China.
At least 12 journalists remain imprisoned in China, including Gao Yu, a reporter
serving a six-year sentence for "leaking state secrets" in articles she wrote
for Mirror Monthly, a Hong Kong magazine. Although she is seriously
ill and has been honored by numerous international groups, Beijing has refused
to heed calls for her release.Wang Dan, a leader of the 1989 Tiananmen Square
protest movement, was released from prison and sent into exile in the United
States in April, continuing a pattern of deporting democracy movement leaders.
Late in the year, an article in The People's Daily, the official
newspaper of the Communist Party, reported that 190 people had received prison
terms for distributing or storing illegal political publications, but it
was not possible to independently verify that report. |
| Attacks on the Press in
China in 1998 |
| Date |
Journalist |
Incident |
| 11/17/98 |
Juergen
Kremb, Der Spiegel |
Expelled |
| 10/04/98 |
Yukihisa
Nakatsu, Yomiuri Shimbun |
Expelled |
| 09/05/98 |
Shi
Binhai, China Economic Times |
Imprisoned |
| 09/02/98 |
Natalie
Liu, CBS News |
Imprisoned, Harassed |
| 08/19/98 |
Albert
Cheng, Commercial Radio Station |
Attacked |
| 06/20/98 |
Artin
Basu, Radio Free Asia |
Censored |
| 06/20/98 |
Patricia
Hindman, Radio Free Asia |
Censored |
| 06/20/98 |
Feng
Xiaoming, Radio Free Asia |
Censored |
| 06/20/98 |
Apple
Daily |
Censored |
| 06/20/98 |
Next
Magazine |
Censored |
| 04/19/98 |
Wang
Dan |
Expelled |
| 03/25/98 |
Lin
Hai, software entrepreneur |
Imprisoned, Legal Action |
|
|
