No Simple Options When The Table Is An Illusion

Michael Hedges March 18, 2020 - Follow on Twitter

Media messaging is a war zone today. Authoritarian rulers take this very seriously. Some, perhaps, are mindful of their predecessors’ missteps and, for them, the dire consequences. This is not simply a public relations exercise. As in all war zones, the real victims are on the ground.

This week the Foreign Ministry of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) sanctioned US-based news organizations; New York Times (NYT), Washington Post (WaPo) and Wall Street Journal (WSJ) as well as international broadcaster Voice of America and Time magazine. All are required to “declare in written form information about their staff, finance, operation and real estate in China.” In addition roughly 13 accredited reporters for NYT, WaPo and WSJ, exact number unclear, all US citizens, have had press credentials revoked. Three had reported from Wuhan at a time Chinese authorities had not revealed the full extent of the coronavirus outbreak and the official response was largely unknown.

The action was taken, said Chinese authorities, in retaliation for US government sanctions on official Communist Party news agency Xinhua, international television channel CGTN, international radio channel China Radio, English-language newspaper/portal China Daily and official Chinese Communist Party organ People’s Daily. All are widely considered state propaganda outlets. The US State Department required information from those agencies similar to that demanded by Chinese authorities as well as reductions in staffing. About 60 employees were expelled, some considered involved in activities unrelated to news reporting.

PRC authorities took another unexpected step in the tit-for-tat this week. The newspaper reporters were not allowed to relocate to Hong Kong or Macau. The Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Hong Kong has asked Hong Kong authorities for clarification on the status of three expelled reporters. The group is seeking issuance of “employment visas without interference from the Chinese government,” said a statement quoted by Hong Kong English-language daily The Standard (March 18). "If that system has changed, it would represent a serious erosion of the One Country, Two Systems principle.”

PRC Foreign Ministry spokesperson Geng Shuang warned that more sanctions on news reporting could follow if the US did not “correct its mistakes,” reported Reuters (March 18). “The US has said that all options are on the table. Today, I can also tell the US that all options are on the table for China.”

Editorial directors with the NYT, WaPo and WSJ, separately, penned admonitions. “The health and safety of people around the world depend on impartial reporting about its two largest economies, both of them battling a common epidemic,” said NYT executive editor Dean Baquet, quoted by CNBC (March 17). He added it is “critical that the governments of the United States and China move quickly to resolve this dispute and allow journalists to do the important work of informing the public.” Separately, the NYT editorial board offered that “the Chinese Communist party is not the first authoritarian regime to adopt (US) President (Donald) Trump’s characterisation of the press.”

“China’s unprecedented attack on freedom of the press comes at a time of unparalleled global crisis,” wrote WSJ editor-in-chief Matt Murray in a statement (March 17). “Trusted news reporting from and about China has never been more important.” Three WSJ reporters were expelled from China last month after an op-ed, which they did not contribute to, referred to China as “the sick man of Asia.”

After that episode, touched off by the US State Department’s moves on the Chinese outlets, Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) executive director Joel Simon, writing in the Columbia Journalism Review (February 21), referred to the “infuriating situation” and warned, presciently, of “reprisals against reporters working for US media outlets in China, further restricting the flow of information in the midst of a global health emergency.” Sanctions on Chinese media workers, he offered, would “turn journalists into diplomatic pawns and provide a framework that favors Chinese censors who are already seeking to control the work of the international media.”

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• Hot Topics - Media in China

• Hot Topics - Propaganda