Report from China – Reporters talk about “unprecedented sanctions”

Incidents of visa denial, surveillance, intimidation and harassment have been reported in daily work. Officials justified the fight against the corona virus by delaying the issuance of visas, banning reporter travels or rejecting interview requests. Nearly half (46 percent) of those surveyed said their offices were understaffed because they could not bring journalists into the country.

“As a result, reporting from China suffers,” the FCCC noted. Chinese reporters who are not allowed to report directly from the country have settled in Taipei, Singapore, Sydney, Seoul or London. “China’s press coverage is increasingly becoming an exercise in remote reporting.”

Followed, controlled

Meanwhile, reporters in the country suffered significant restrictions on their work. Sixty-two percent said they had been prevented from making a single complaint by the police or other authorities. Eighty-eight percent of those who went to the Xinjiang region in northwest China reported being harassed. China has come under international criticism for its treatment of Uyghur Muslims, a minority in Xinjiang.

The report says more than a quarter of journalists knew the evidence had been harassed, arrested or interrogated. Ninety-two percent of respondents denied that they needed permission from their employers or superiors to speak to the foreign media.

Authorities are encouraging lawsuits

Cheng Lee, an Australian journalist who worked for CCTV, and Hayes Fan, a Chinese employee of the financial institution Bloomberg, have been detained for more than a year. No concrete allegations were made – except for vague indications of state security. David Rennie of The Economist says, “The risk environment is changing dramatically right now.