Foreign reporters manhandled, threatened in China

Rejected visas, travel restrictions, and threats against local sources have made reporting in China a difficult task for the hundreds of foreign correspondents in the communist country, according to a recent report.

The Foreign Correspondents’ Club of China, which has 243 members from 31 countries, released a paper Friday noting conditions have drastically worsened since 2008, when the country relaxed restrictions ahead of the Beijing Olympics. Of the correspondents surveyed, 80 percent said their work conditions had deteriorated or stayed the same compared to 2013, while no one said conditions had improved.

While Chinese state-run news networks and newspapers continue to take advantage of press freedoms in other countries to expand their global media influence, China stymies foreign reporters in their country aiming for the same thing. The report found that two-thirds of correspondents said they experienced “interference, harassment, or violence” while reporting, and 10 percent said officials have manhandled or used physical force against them. TV journalists are often the target of such rough behavior, and reporters traveling to “sensitive” areas, such as the volatile Xinjiang, are either turned away or followed and harassed.

Touching on what the government considers sensitive topics also leads to threats, denied visas, or entire news sites blocked in China. After The New York Times and Bloomberg published separate articles about the family wealth of prominent Chinese leaders, both have been blocked in China. Since last year, Reuters and The Wall Street Journal also are inaccessible.

Before June 4, the 25th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre, public security officials rounded up foreign correspondents and lectured them about reporting on the anniversary and threatened them with severe consequences should they disobey. Some were visited by officials at their apartments or bureaus, the report said.

The biggest struggle may be the foreign correspondent’s relationships with locals. Often sources are intimidated into not speaking with journalists: The survey found 66 such incidents in 2014, including interviewees who have been taken away immediately after speaking with foreign reporters. Technically, the Chinese Constitution protects the freedom of speech for its citizens.

In July, the country’s top media regulator banned domestic reporters from giving any information to foreign media or writing for any foreign publications. Media companies are still allowed to hire assistants or drivers, but many are monitored by security authorities. Half of the survey respondents said their assistants had been harassed or intimidated, with one unnamed correspondent of an American media organization saying that “an intern was pressured to spy on us, and then forced to quit the internship when he refused to cooperate with the Public Security Bureau.”

About 18 percent of correspondents had difficulty renewing their visas, and since 2008, Huffington Post, GlobalPost.com, PBS News Hour, and the French news site mediapart.fr were denied the ability to open bureaus in China. Huffington Post has since received a temporary journalist visa.

“China’s poor record on allowing open and unfettered reporting is in conflict with its desire to be seen as a modern society deserving of global respect,” the report said. “And it is in great contrast with the wide access Chinese journalists have enjoyed when reporting in many foreign countries.”