Frankfurter Rundschau: Chinese Truths - Beijing Attempts Censure of Falun Gong Reports

November 22, 2001

By Haral Maass (Beijing)

When ARD-correspondent Stefan Nieman wanted to file a report about the Falun Gong protest action happenings at Tiananmen Square last Tuesday, he found his workday brought to a halt at the police station.

He had been arrested, together with journalist Jutta Lietsch, who writes for the Leipziger Volkszeitung (Leipzig People's News), and a CNN-camera operator. No one carried a hand-held camera. Lietsch had stood a few meters too close to the action. That in itself is a breach of conduct in the eyes of Beijing's leaders. Both those two journalists were detained in police custody for two hours and then officially presented at the Foreign Ministry. "They have broken Chinese laws and had to expect serious consequences," so said Beijing bureaucrats.

Mr. Niemann and Ms. Lietsch had only carried out their jobs, and that can sometime be somewhat complicated in the PRC. Several dozen foreign reporters were present at Tiananmen Square last Tuesday. Falun Gong followers had alerted them via telephone and Internet that "something big is going to happen that day at Tiananmen Square." Since Beijing's laws of censure require pre-notification and permits for any kind of activity [at Tiananmen Square], the world press appeared in the guise of tourists. A German reporter appeared to photograph his posing girlfriend and in the process set his zoom lens exactly for the Falun Gong group. Radio correspondents wore tiny microphones pinned to their collars, to document the protest cries. An Australian photographer held a miniature camera at hip height and photographed a policeman as he stamped on the stomach of a Falun Gong member. In spite of the more open economy, to date, nothing has changed in China's censure laws. According to the official "Handbook for Foreign Journalists," every planned interview must be pre-registered with the proper foreign departments. When journalists travel inside China, it is the rule that they be accompanied by chaperones, whose expenses must be paid for by the journalists. For a few years now, some of these rules had been somewhat relaxed. When dealing with a sensitive issue, such as Falun Gong, which the ruling party designated an "undesirable group," journalists are subject to the full governmental wrath and might.

Niemann and Lietsch, together with the demonstrators, were driven to the police station. The surprised journalists saw familiar faces. It was the same authority figures who decide about extending the journalists' visas who conducted the interrogations. Their tone was cordial, but no-nonsense: Niemann and Lietsch had conducted "illegal research" since they had done their work without the proper permits, so declared the government representatives. When Ms. Lietsch pointed out that she neither took photographs nor conducted any interviews, one of the policemen replied: "If you only LOOK in that direction you are breaking the law." ARD-correspondent Niemann, who has filmed with a hand-held camera, was ordered Wednesday to appear together with the German press-attache at the German Embassy to appear at the Foreign Ministry. "You are a rabble-rouser and part of a Western media conspiracy, in alliance with the Falun Gong movement," said Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhang Qiyue. It seems obvious that there are already conspirators in China's state-sponsored propaganda machine, because the China Daily, on its front page, already reported on Wednesday that the Falun Gong people had been arrested. Could those [Chinese] colleagues have already applied in advance for a permit? (Indicates that they had the news already before it actually happened).

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