Bob Dietz: Covering the Beijing Games? Expect to be Censored
Bob Dietz of the Committee to Protect Journalists writes on the Huffington Post about the Chinese government’s failure to keep its promises of media access in the run-up to the Olympics:
So what should foreign reporters expect when they go to cover the Games? When sensitive stories arise — Falun Gong demonstrations, angry AIDS sufferers calling for recognition in Tiananmen Square, pro-democracy activists sitting in front of a Western embassy, pro-Tibetan demonstrators unfurling banners whenever they see a western camera crew on the street — reporters can expect to be met with a hostile security response. Foreign reporters say the experience of being hauled away and detained usually lasts for a few hours and hardly ever turns physical. Recommended responses vary from being combative, calling your embassy and making a stink, to just rolling with the situation and being polite, shrugging it off and getting back to the job.
Last year CPJ published a reporter’s guide and China backgrounder called Falling Short. We released an updated version yesterday. The report expresses our greater concern: While we don’t want to sound blasé, we are not as concerned with foreign journalists’ safety as much as the safety of the people they interview and the young Chinese staff they will hire to act as assistants, fixers, translators and runners. Many will be young and enthusiastic, and not as knowing of the way the media game is played by Chinese journalists, who have learned to protect themselves and not to jeopardize their sources.
Read the updated version of CPJ’s report Falling Short.
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Origin: Bob Dietz, Huffington Post
