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The AP Is Irate At China’s Controlled News

From the DNC’s Associated Press:

China offers its own version of protests

By CARA ANNA, Associated Press Writer

CHENGDU, China - With restive Tibetan areas swarming with troops and closed to scrutiny from the outside world, China’s government turned up efforts Saturday to put its own version of the unrest before the international public.

Information barely trickled out of the Tibetan capital Lhasa and other far-flung Tibetan communities, where foreign media were banned and thousands of troops dispatched to quell the most widespread demonstrations against Chinese rule in nearly five decades.

The Chinese government was attempting to fill the vacuum with its own message. It disseminated footage of Tibetan protesters attacking Chinese and accusations of biased reporting by Western media via TV, the Internet, e-mail and YouTube, which is blocked in China. The communist government’s leading newspaper called to “resolutely crush” the Tibetan demonstrations.

The media barrage underscored that the government campaign is moving into a new phase of damage control ahead of the much-anticipated Beijing Olympics in August.

While China’s rigorous policing of the Internet is far from foolproof, its official Internet is pervasive and there is no easy access to an alternative in the country. The difficulty of confirming what is going on inside Tibet may also be hindering a stronger world reaction.

“They’ve successfully managed the messages available to the average Chinese citizen, and this has fueled broad public support for a heavy-handed approach to controlling unrest,” said David Bandurski, a Hong Kong University expert on Chinese media. “There will be no nuances to Tibet coverage.”

CNN’s bureau in Beijing has been deluged in recent days by a barrage of harassing phone calls and faxes that accuse the organization of unfair coverage. An e-mail to United Nations-based reporters purportedly from China’s U.N. mission sent an Internet link to a 15-minute state television program showing Tibetans attacking Chinese in Lhasa.

A slideshow posted on YouTube accused CNN, Germany’s Der Spiegel and other media of cropping pictures to show Chinese military while screening out Tibetan rioters or putting pictures of Indian and Nepalese police wrestling Tibetan protesters with captions about China’s crackdown.

Though of uncertain origin, the piece at least had official blessing, with excerpts appearing on the official English-language China Daily and on state TV…

A group of 29 well-known Chinese dissident writers, lawyers, political activists and other intellectuals decried China’s approach to the unrest.

“At present the one-sided propaganda of the official Chinese media is having the effect of stirring up inter-ethnic animosity and aggravating an already tense situation,” said a letter signed by the 29 and circulating via e-mail.

Their appeal, however, was likely to go unheeded by a government that has blacklisted many of the signers for their activism.

The ruling Communist Party’s flagship newspaper struck an uncompromising line.

“We must see through the secessionist forces’ evil intentions, uphold the banner of maintaining social stability … and resolutely crush the ‘Tibet independence’ forces’ conspiracy,” People’s Daily said in an editorial…

This is of course very disturbing news.

But is it not somewhat ironic for the Associated Press of all people to get on their high horses about doing the government’s bidding?

When the Democrats are in power, they surely do their bidding. As they do even in those rare moments when they are not. 

(Thanks to Dave2882 for the heads up.)

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This article was posted by Steve Gilbert on Saturday, March 22nd, 2008 at 11:29 am. You can leave a response.

3 Responses to “The AP Is Irate At China’s Controlled News”

  1. Dave2882
    March 23rd, 2008 at 1:41 pm

    Olympic flame to be lit Monday, amidst protests

    From the Associated Press, which has changed its story since the time I copied what was there:

    China lashes out at crackdown critics

    CHENGDU, China - China lashed out Sunday at critics of its crackdown on Tibetan protesters, describing U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi as “habitually bad tempered” while claiming the Western media serve those who want to smear the communist country.

    The barrage of complaints carried in official media — which included more broadsides against the Dalai Lama — came as the country sought to present its own version of the deadly anti-Chinese protests and their aftermath. The crackdown has been a public relations disaster for China ahead of the Beijing Olympics — a Thailand torchbearer withdrew Sunday in protest.

    With foreign media banned and troops dispatched en masse to quell the most widespread demonstrations against Chinese rule in nearly five decades, independent information barely trickled out of the Tibetan capital Lhasa and other far-flung communities.

    The People’s Daily, the main mouthpiece of the Communist Party, placed the blame for the recent riots on Tibet’s exiled spiritual leader, the Nobel Peace Prize-winning Dalai Lama.

    “The Dalai clique is scheming to take the Beijing Olympics hostage to force the Chinese government to make concessions to Tibet independence,” it said.

    The attacks on the Dalai Lama have been aimed at further demonizing him in the eyes of the Chinese public, which strongly supports the Olympics. The Dalai Lama, who advocates nonviolence and denies being behind the March 14 riots in Lhasa, asserted Sunday that he has supported China’s hosting of the summer Games.

    “I mean the Olympics…take place in Beijing…so that more than 1 billion human beings, that means Chinese, they feel proud of it,” he said on the sidelines of a Buddhist prayer session in New Delhi.

    The official Xinhua New Agency, meanwhile, published a commentary bashing Pelosi, a fierce critic of China who on Friday visited the Dalai Lama at his headquarters in India, where she called China’s crackdown “a challenge to the conscience of the world.”

    Xinhua accused Pelosi of ignoring the violence caused by the Tibetan rioters. “‘Human rights police’ like Pelosi are habitually bad tempered and ungenerous when it comes to China, refusing to check their facts and find out the truth of the case,” it said.

    “Her views are like so many other politicians and western media. Beneath the double standards lies their intention to serve the interest groups behind them, who want to contain or smear China.”

    Reports of how many people died in the violence have varied and been impossible to independently verify. China raised its death toll to 22, with Xinhua reporting Saturday that the charred remains of an 8-month-old boy and four adults were pulled from a garage burned down in Lhasa last Sunday — two days after the city erupted in anti-Chinese rioting. The Dalai Lama’s exiled government says 99 Tibetans have been killed, 80 in Lhasa, 19 in Gansu province.

    The Chinese government has sought to portray itself and Chinese businesses as the victims.

    Xinhua said Sunday that 94 people had been injured in four counties and one city in Gansu province in riots on March 15-16. It said that 64 police, 27 armed police, two government officials and one civilian were hurt. It made no mention of any injuries to the protesters…

    - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

    Jim Jubak writes an investment column for MSN Money Here are some excerpts from his column:

    China’s looming Olympics disaster

    The Beijing games are supposed to showcase China’s stature on the world stage. But they’re producing protests at home and may shut down big hunks of the nation’s economy.

    On March 10, Haile Gebrselassie, the world record holder in the marathon, ruled out competing in the race at August’s Beijing Olympics. The city’s notoriously bad air pollution posed a threat to his health over the 26.2-mile course, the Ethiopian runner said.

    It says a lot about the disaster that’s unfolding for the Beijing games that the withdrawal of an Olympic favorite caused hardly a ripple. And why should it when bigger stories are brewing? It’s possible that:

    * A forced shutdown of Beijing’s factories and power plants during the games will throw China into an economic downturn.

    * Diversion of safe food to the Olympic Village will cause food riots elsewhere in China.

    * The transfer of 80 billion gallons of water — equal to the annual water consumption of Tucson, Ariz., a city of 535,000 — from Shaanxi and other provinces in northwestern China will shut down factories and agriculture in the region.

    Yes, the Beijing Olympics, which were supposed to showcase China to the world, are still likely to provide exactly the kind of prestige-building extravaganza that the country’s leaders had hoped for. But domestically, the games are quickly turning into an economic and political disaster. Once upon a time — maybe six months ago — investors (including yours truly) looked on the Olympics as a guarantee that China’s stock market and economy would keep chugging along through the summer. “Safe until August” was the mantra.

    Now, it increasingly looks like the games themselves could be the catalyst for a significant downturn in China’s stock market and economy.

    Steps haven’t been enough

    Observers already knew that China was serious about cutting air pollution in Beijing and that, if necessary, the government would shut down factories and power plants. Pollution had been one of the reasons China lost its 1993 bid to host the 2000 Olympics, and this time around, the country promised the International Olympic Committee that it would clean up Beijing’s act before the games.

    Officials converted coal-fired furnaces to natural gas. Factories have been relocated to the suburbs. Millions of trees have been planted to break the winds that blow dust in from the plains north and west of the city. Older taxis have been replaced with 80,000 newer models that produce less pollution. Heavy trucks are permitted to enter the city only at night. The city expanded its subway system and built a rail line to connect the airport to downtown.

    And it still hasn’t been enough. Thanks to China’s rapid economic growth and Beijing’s own stunning growth — the local economy is up 144% since 2000 — car ownership has soared. The city has 3 million vehicles and is adding 400,000 cars and trucks a year. Power plants burn cleaner, low-sulfur coal, but they burn a lot more of it: 30 million tons in 2007. A building boom has added 1.7 billion square feet of construction since 2002, contributing to the city’s problem with dust. Daily concentrations of particulates in Beijing equal those in New York, Los Angeles, Washington, Chicago and Atlanta combined.

    Desperate for solutions

    The only way for the government to deliver anything close to the air-pollution targets it has promised is to enforce a Draconian short-term fix: Shut down the sources of pollution for the duration of the games. Some coal-fired power plants, cement factories, steel-making plants and chemical plants in Beijing, Tianjin and four neighboring provinces will be shut for 30 days before the Olympics begin Aug. 8. Ten major polluters have already been shut, according to the State Environmental Protection Administration.

    Some factories that remain open will not operate at full capacity. For example, Shougang, this year China’s second-largest producer of construction-grade steel, will cut production in half, to 4 million metric tons.

    Water pollution is, in some ways, easier to fix. Just pump in enough clean water from surrounding areas to meet the needs of the 16,000 athletes and officials who will arrive in Beijing for the games (and to make the city look lush and green for an international TV audience).

    One tiny problem: The city and surrounding region aren’t exactly swimming in water. Beijing sits at the edge of the water-poor northern China plain, more than 90 miles from the sea and distant from any of China’s major rivers. To make up for the deficit in surface water, Beijing has relied on wells, but the city has pumped water out faster than it is replaced from natural sources. The groundwater level under the city has fallen 75 feet in the past 50 years.

    Farms without water

    To get water for Beijing, surrounding provinces have been ordered to ship the cleanest water to the capital. In some farm areas, that means no water from local reservoirs and limited irrigation supply from local wells. Farmers in some areas have been ordered to grow only corn, which takes less water but fetches a lower market price than rice or vegetables. Compensation to poor farmers required to ship water to the richer city: about $30. And even that isn’t paid to everyone.

    No wonder local officials have been screaming. An Qiyuan, a member of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Committee for Shaanxi and former Communist party chief for Shaanxi, went public in the foreign press with a demand for compensation. “We still need to live,” he told the Financial Times, “so I say the government needs to compensate Shaanxi. If you don’t compensate the masses, then how can they survive?”

    The theme of starving the poorer countryside for the benefit of the wealthy cities hits an especially sensitive nerve. The fruits of China’s boom have gone disproportionately to city dwellers and the country’s coastal regions.

    In 2006, Chinese government figures put annual per capita household income at $1,475 for urban households and just $450 per capita for rural households. That inequality has become painfully obvious because inflation, which hit a 12-year peak in February, has come crashing down hardest on China’s poorest. Although overall inflation is running at just 8.7% annually, food costs soared 23.3%, according to the National Statistics Bureau. The price of pork, a staple source of protein, has climbed 63% since February 2007. The price of cooking oil has risen 41%.

    Ham-handed publicity

    It doesn’t help stem public outrage that the government just doesn’t seem to get it. In October, as pork prices were starting to soar out of control and stories about tainted food supplies were causing increasing worry, the government staged an elaborate public-relations event to showcase the special pigs that Qianxihe Food Group (branded as Lucky Crane in English) would supply for the Olympics. At 10 special farms, carefully chosen pigs were being raised with only the purest food, air and water. The pork, according to the China Meat Research Center, will cost at least twice as much as pork now on the market in China.

    Think about how that goes over in a country that has recently witnessed deaths as crowds rushed to buy cheap cooking oil. This pork will be absolutely safe to eat, but most Chinese won’t be able to afford it.

    http://articles.moneycentral.m.....aster.aspx

    Is this something we want our flag and country associated with in the Parade of Nations when the Olympic Games open August 8 in China?

    One way to keep that from happening is to contact your Representative and Senators.

    Particularly important to contact would be Senator Joe Biden. You can contact him here. He is Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. During the Democratic nomination debates, he called for a military response to the atrocities in Darfur. While this was arguably an unwise idea, it was a heartfelt response on his part in my opinion.

    You can contact Speaker Pelosi here. She’s Pelosi, but she appears to be on the right side on this issue.

    I’ve faxed a letter to Senator Biden and sent electronic communication to Senators Biden and Pelosi. Apparently, snail mail to the capital is experiencing significant delays due to security concerns.

    Information on writing letters to Congress can be found here.

    Wouldn’t it be great if we had their inboxes full by the time the Olympic flame is lit on Monday? It will be lit in Athens. And carried to China.

  2. Dave2882
    March 23rd, 2008 at 3:10 pm

    From Wikipedia:

    The Olympic Flame, Olympic Fire, Olympic Torch, Olympic Light, Olympic Eye, and Olympic Sun are all names for an important symbol of the Olympic Games. Commemorating the theft of fire from the Greek god Zeus by Prometheus, its origins lie in ancient Greece, when a fire was kept burning throughout the celebration of the ancient Olympics. The fire was reintroduced at the 1928 Summer Olympics, and it has been part of the modern Olympic Games ever since. The modern torch relay was introduced by Carl Diem, president of the Organisation Committee for the Berlin Games of 1936, as part of an effort to turn the games into a glorification of the Third Reich.[1] The torch ceremony is still practiced as of 2008.

    1. Hitler’s Berlin Games Helped Make Some Emblems Popular, New York Times, 2004-08-14. Retrieved on 2006-08-12.

  3. Dave2882
    March 25th, 2008 at 11:20 pm

    The lighting of the Olympic torch occurs in the sanctuary of Olympia, not in Athens.

    From the website of the International Olympic Committee:

    The Olympic torch has been lit today in front of the Temple of Hera on the historic grounds of Olympia, in the birthplace of Olympism, where the Ancient Olympic Games took place. The flame was lit successfully by a Holy Priestess, according to the traditional ritual, using the sun’s rays and a parabolic mirror…

    Following the mythical lightning, the priestess entered the Ancient Olympic Stadium with the torch and handed it over to the first runner of the Beijing 2008 Torch Relay. The young man passed by the tomb where Pierre de Coubertin’s heart is buried, to launch the long journey of harmony of this Relay.

    You can watch a video of the lighting ceremony here.


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