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Information minister rejects criticism of China�s treatment of media, internet users (FOSTER KLUG - Associated Press)
October 27, 2006 6:55 PM
Copyright Associated Press
Washington:
Chinas information minister told Americans on Wednesday that claims his country tramples internet and media freedoms stem from a cultural misunderstanding of the role the press plays in Chinese society.
The US State Departments annual global human rights report accuses China of clamping down on print, broadcast and electronic media and censoring internet content. But Cai Wu, the state councils minister of information, insisted that Chinese websites offer probably the most free forum for opinion in the world.
With more than 100 million internet users and millions of websites, Cai said that when a breaking news story emerges, thousands of follow-up posts spring up within minutes in cyberspace.
In China, we think that the relationship between the media, the society and the government should be characterised by coordination and cooperation, rather than by confrontation, Cai said in remarks at a Washington hotel, speaking through an interpreter.
China, he explained, has different press concepts than the West. In some Western countries, good news is not news; bad news or strange news is news. For example, if a dog bites people, its not news; but if people bite dogs, thats news.
His comments belie regular, often harsh criticism by US government officials, academics and rights groups of Chinas treatment of the press.
A survey earlier this year by the Committee to Protect Journalists said of China: Never have so many lines of communication in the hands of so many people been met with such obsessive resistance from a central authority.
As local Chinese media test government controls in efforts to capture more readers, Chinese President Hu Jintaos government has pushed back.
The US government has said that dozens of dissidents are held in Chinese prisons for internet activity. Zhao Yan, a researcher for The New York Times, was cleared in August of charges that he leaked state secrets to foreigners but convicted on unrelated charges of fraud and sentenced to three years in prison.
During Cais remarks at an event sponsored by the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank, he did not comment about specific journalists cases.
I can assure you that in China no journalist or any individual will be arrested or jailed due to his different opinion or [because] he expressed some opinion against the government. Maybe there are some other reasons for arrests, he said.
In response to a question on whether media control is a good or a bad thing, he asked a question of his own: Could you find any country in the world where there is no control at all on press or media? There exists control over media in all the countries, sometimes by government, sometimes by media themselves.
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