{"id":2033,"date":"2014-07-07T16:39:54","date_gmt":"2014-07-07T16:39:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.chinesepen.org\/english\/?p=2033"},"modified":"2014-07-07T16:39:54","modified_gmt":"2014-07-07T16:39:54","slug":"tienchi-martin-liao%ef%bc%9aa-mud-battle-fought-in-a-quagmire-censorship-and-corruption-in-chinese-journalism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.chinesepen.org\/english\/tienchi-martin-liao%ef%bc%9aa-mud-battle-fought-in-a-quagmire-censorship-and-corruption-in-chinese-journalism","title":{"rendered":"Tienchi Martin-Liao\uff1aA Mud Battle Fought in A Quagmire-Censorship and corruption in Chinese journalism"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Tienchi Martin-Liao \/ November 20, 2013<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"
\nChen Yongzhou<\/p>\n

Express reporter Chen Yongzhu. Photo courtesy of Tienchi Martin-Liao via news.163.com.<\/p>\n

Over the last 18 months Chen Yongzhou, a journalist for the Guangzhou newspaper New Express, wrote a series of articles exposing the wrongdoings of Zoomlion, a giant manufacturer of construction machinery and sanitation equipment. On October 19 Chen was arrested by the cross-province security police of Changsha, Hunan province, who accused him of defaming Zoomlion\u2019s business reputation. Following this, in support of Chen, New Express published a bold appeal in the paper\u2014\u201cRelease him!\u201d\u2014along with the statement, \u201cAlthough our newspaper is small and poor, yet backbones we do have.\u201d Three days later, on October 26, Chen appeared on CCTV. He conceded that he received bribes to compose false reports about Zoomlion. New Express quickly printed an apology on its front page saying, \u201cChen was instigated by others, accepted bribes and published numerous false reports.\u201d<\/p>\n

Alas! Within a week Chen\u2019s backbone was broken, and so was the newspaper\u2019s. Did Chen tell the truth on television or was his confession the result of torture, threats, suppression, and horse trade in a fabricated farce by the authority? We can only guess. Anyway, Chen\u2019s case has not only triggered a discussion about censorship, it has also started a dialogue about the ethics of journalism in China.<\/p>\n

The master-servant relationship between the government and the media in China is not a secret. On the day Chen appeared on TV, China Digital Times published a copy of the Chinese government\u2019s censorship instructions under the mocking title \u201cDirectives from the Ministry of Truth.\u201d The instructions were as follows: \u201cCentral Propaganda Department: New Express reporter Chen Yongzhou accepted bribes to publish a number of inaccurate reports. The media must use the full text of Xinhua News Agency\u2019s wire copy regarding this incident, no exceptions. Do not comment, and do not publish images. All Weibo accounts managed by media must absolutely follow these requirements when posting.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

For detail please visit here<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Tienchi Martin-Liao \/ November 20, 20 … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[167,91],"tags":[564,1343,251,108],"views":1276,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chinesepen.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2033"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chinesepen.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chinesepen.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chinesepen.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chinesepen.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2033"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.chinesepen.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2033\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2035,"href":"https:\/\/www.chinesepen.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2033\/revisions\/2035"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chinesepen.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2033"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chinesepen.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2033"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chinesepen.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2033"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}