The translations are by Rogier Creemers of China Copyright and Media.

21 March 2006

Please immediately delete “Nationwide, 109 Professors Issue Open Letter to Call for Resistance Against Academic Corruption.”

20 March 2006

Please immediately delete the article about a doctoral supervisor at Wuhan University who is suspected to be involved in plagiarism.  Please acknowledge receipt, thank you.

20 March 2006

Information Office Notice (Fan Tao): Please immediately delete the article “Strike Incident of More than 200 Shops in Beijing Yashow Fashion Market.”

19 March 2006

Concerning reports on the “Yuan Baojing Hired Murder Case” are not to be played up by all websites, corresponding information is to be pushed to the back stage without exception, close news trackers, forums are also not to discuss this. The concrete implementation is: it may be reported on channels, columns, communities and banners, but not put on the front page; forums may issue standard or simplified copy from Xinhua Net, etc., items playing this up or inciting matters are to be deleted.

18 March 2006

Everyone, according to Japanese media reports, a number of Japanese members of parliament are planning to inspect the Diaoyu Islands on 20 March, this matter remains to be verified, and is not to be reported for the moment without exception, for relevant reporting, use Xinhua copy without exception, forums and blogs are not to discuss this matter, do not send short messages.

18 March 2006

Supervision and management information notice from the Information Office: everyone, concerning the case of a Japanese female student being attacked yesterday evening at Beijing Language and Culture University, there is to be no reporting without exception, forums are not to discuss this, please at the same time notify all blogs and search engines.

18 March 2006

Beijing Municipal Public Security Bureau Network Supervision Office notice: Brothers, very sorry, tomorrow, focus on supervising and controlling information on Japan, and information on assemblies and demonstrations related to Japan. If it is there, immediately call 85223522.

17 March 2006

On the case of consumers suing the Beijing Municipal Development and Reform Commission, and requiring to convene a special hearing on “dispute settlement on water resources and water pricing,” please do not put it on the main page of web sites and the main page of news centres, and close trackers. Please acknowledge receipt, thank you.

17 March 2006

Please delete articles corresponding to “Wen Jiabao Attends East Asia Summit and Responds to Stupid Ichiro Koizumi’s Tough Speech, Shock!!!!!!” or “Of China’s Present 599 Intercontinental Nuclear Missiles, 299 Nuclear Missiles Are Aimed At Japan,” if you see them afterwards, because their content involves State secrets.

16 March 2006

The source of the article “During the Two Sessions, Beijing Puts In 165,000 Police Man Hours and Sends Away 2000 Beggars” is incorrect, please delete it.

15 March 2006

Please do not put the Beijing News article “Special Interview with Huangfu Ping: Guard Against Denying Reform Under the Name of Revisionism” on the front page of websites, in the important news area, putting it in the domestic news section will do, at the same time, close trackers on this news. Please acknowledge receipt, thank you.

12 March 2006

Please do not put the case of “an explosion in a house in Leye District, Guangxi, killing nine and injuring four” on the front page of websites and in the important news section, do not set up special subjects.

It is stressed again that the case of the strange death of Milosevic is not to be played up.

2006年3月北京网管办发出的禁令（二）
2006-03-21

“全国109名教授发公开信呼吁抵制学术腐败”，请立即删除。
2006-03-20

武汉大学博导涉嫌抄袭原北大教师论文被起诉一文，请予删除。收到请回复，谢谢。
2006-03-20

新闻办通知（范涛）：“北京岳秀服装市场发生200多户商户罢市事件”一文，请立即删除。
2006-03-19

有关“袁宝景雇凶杀人案”的报道，各网站不要炒作，相关消息一律压至后台，关闭新闻跟帖，论坛也不讨论。具体执行为：频道、专栏、公社、动力可报道但不推首页；论坛可发新华网等正规或简化报道，炒作及煽动性的删。
2006-03-18

各位，据日本媒体报道，日一些议员拟于3月20日视察钓鱼岛，此事尚有待证实，暂一律不得报道，有关报道，一律采用新华社通稿，论坛、博客不讨论此事，不发短信
2006-03-18

新闻办的监管信息通知：各位，关于昨晚北京语言大学一日本女留学生遇袭事件，一律不报道，论坛不讨论，请同时通知各自的博客，搜索。
2006-03-18

北京市公安局网监处通知：兄弟们，辛苦了，明天重点监控涉日信息，涉日集会、游行的信息。有就立刻打电话　85223522
2006-03-17

消费者状告北京市发改委，要求召开“自行解决水资源水价”听证会一事，请不要放在网站首页和新闻中心首页，关闭跟贴。收到请回复，谢谢。
2006-03-17

“温总理出席东亚峰会回应小犬蠢一郎强硬发言，震撼！！！！！！” 或者是“中国现有的五百九十九枚州际核导弹中的二百九十九枚核导弹是对准日本的” 由于个中内容涉及国家机密，请以后看到相关的文章请予删除。

2006-03-16

“两会北京投入警力16.5万人次遣散2000乞讨人员”一文，稿源不对，请删除。
2006-03-15

新京报稿件《专访皇甫平：警惕以反思之名否定改革》，请不要发网站首页、新闻要闻区，放置在国内新闻区即可，同时关闭此新闻的跟帖。收到请回复，谢谢。

2006-03-12

“广西乐业县民房发生爆炸9人死亡4人受伤”一事及后续报道，请不要放在网站首页和新闻中心要闻区，不要开设专题；

再次强调米洛舍维奇死亡一事，不要炒作。

These translated directives were first posted by Rogier Creemers on China Copyright and Media on November 18, 2012 (here).

© Anne.Henochowicz for China Digital Times (CDT), 2012. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: academic corruption, Beijing, Beijing Internet Instructions, Beijing News, censorship, Censorship Vault, diaoyu islands, Directives from the Ministry of Truth, east asia summit, Guangxi, Huangfu Ping, Internet censorship, Japan, Junichiro Koizumi, Ministry of Truth, police, state secrets, two sessions, water, Wen Jiabao, wuhan, Xinhua, Yuan Baojing
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At a news conference Monday in Beijing, prosecutors said the two men had profited by sharing confidential data, from the country’s economic growth rate to retail sales and inflation numbers.

The government said the leaks had allowed people in the securities industry to engage in a form of insider trading in Chinese stocks because they had had an unfair advantage over others in the market. But Chinese economic data could also have an effect on prices of stocks in Hong Kong and overseas markets.

Li Zhongcheng, a deputy director in the state prosecutor’s office, said at the news conference in Beijing that the leaks “disrupt fair market competition, affect the government’s credibility and cause huge losses to the interest of the country, society and the people.”

China has struggled to keep a lid on key data and protect the credibility of its stock market for years, and this summer it began to accelerate the reporting of statistics in an effort to reduce leaks. Today’s punishments represent the toughest action yet and, hopefully, a clear deterrent against future disclosures of secret information. From Bloomberg:

“It’s like killing the chicken to scare the monkeys,” he said, using a Chinese idiom. “It’s also aimed at those who dig for information and manipulate the stock market.”

The consumer-price index figure was accurately circulated in the market or in the press before the official release for at least five of the six months through April this year.

Such early disclosure has helped move markets in the world’s second-biggest economy.

After rumors circulated on the Internet in February that inflation for the previous month would be a lower-than-forecast 4.9 percent, China’s benchmark Shanghai Composite Index rose 2.5 percent, the most in two months, on speculation China wouldn’t need to raise interest rates further to cool rising prices. After the statistics bureau’s official release a day later, which matched the number, the market ended almost unchanged.

See also previous CDT coverage of Chinese state secrets, including the compromised confidentiality of its nuclear power industry and the detainment of a journalist for exposing the cover-up of a crime by local officials.

© Scott Greene for China Digital Times (CDT), 2011. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: economic data, information leak, state secrets, stock market
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For a nation not yet inured to lurid and senseless crime, a report that a former civil servant in central China kept six women enslaved in an underground bunker — and that he killed two of them — was shocking enough.

But perhaps almost as disturbing, at least to some readers, was that the journalist who exposed the crime more than two weeks after the suspect’s arrest was detained by security agents who accused him of revealing state secrets ….

“I was only thinking about how to make my story as accurate as possible and to satisfy the public’s right to know, but I soon discovered that I failed to address the most important issue — face,” wrote Mr. Ji, a reporter for Southern Metropolis Daily, one of the country’s most aggressively independent publications. “Before the truth becomes a state secret, the public and myself need answers ….”

In his posting on Friday, Mr. Ji said he stumbled upon the story this week after spending a few days in Luoyang to investigate the murder of a local television reporter. In his follow-up article, he said his questioners deemed the case a state secret because, he later learned, they feared that its revelation might tarnish Luoyang’s quest to become a “Civilized City” as part of a national competition.

A further blemish on the city’s name is the beating and abduction of a Luoyang tourist in Beijing after he was mistaken for a petitioner. Six officials have been punished following the incident, according to Xinhua.

Update: Shanghaiist notes uncertainty surrounding Li Hao’s former occupation: “… while most Chinese sources say he was a firefighter, AFP reports he possibly worked for the city’s ‘technological supervision bureau.’”

© Samuel Wade for China Digital Times (CDT), 2011. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: detention, journalists, kidnapping, Luoyang, murder, rape, state secrets
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Jin (57), who is of ethnic Korean descent, suddenly broke contact during the Lunar New Year’s holidays in 2009 and has not been heard from since. Japanese and Hong Kong media reported at the time that he had been arrested by Chinese authorities for leaking state secrets.

Born in the Yanbian region in northeastern China, Jin received his master’s degrees from Yanbian University and his PhD in International Politics from Tokyo University in 1994. In 1986, Jin spent a year at the University of Connecticut in the U.S. as a visiting scholar. In 2006, he was appointed deputy director of the Institute of Japanese Studies at CASS and has made numerous comments to the Japanese media about the diplomatic situation surrounding the Korean Peninsula.

Jin was accused of taking bribes from Japanese and South Korean intelligence agencies and leaking information to foreign media that the North Korean leader had become gravely ill and that Chinese doctors had been dispatched to Pyongyang to treat him.

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2011. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: CASS, Kim Jong-il, North Korea relations, state secrets
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“I am extremely disappointed in the outcome although it wasn’t completely unexpected,” said U.S. Ambassador to China Jon Huntsman. “We ask the Chinese government to consider an immediate humanitarian parole of Xue Feng thereby allowing him to get back to his family and his way of life.”

The geologist, a naturalized American citizens, was convicted on charges of violating state secrets and faces a fine of 200,000 yuan (about U.S. $30,400). Xue has spent about three years in prison since his arrest.

University of Chicago’s Dr. David B. Rowley, Xue’s former professor who has rallied for his release, said in July that Xue was languishing in prison on vague charges.

Xue had been working as a geologist for energy consulting firm IHS and was gathering information on China’s oil-wells. His lawyers argue this information does not fall under the category of “state secrets”.

© cdtstaff for China Digital Times (CDT), 2011. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: state secrets, wrongful convictions, Xue Feng
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The two-hour-plus hearing in the case of Xue Feng ended without a judgment. He and his lawyer argued the government wrongly applied its broad powers to classify as secrets information that should be commonly available, said the lawyer, Tong Wei.

Outside the Beijing High People’s Court, a senior U.S. Embassy official called for Xue’s release and return to the U.S. and fumed about the court’s decision to exclude American diplomats.

“This case has not been handled with the kind of transparency that would befit a nation which tells us the rule of law is paramount in all judicial proceedings,” Robert Goldberg, the embassy’s deputy chief of mission, told foreign reporters.

© alicebirney for China Digital Times (CDT), 2010. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: diplomacy, foreigners in China, Human Rights, state secrets, Xue Feng
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Xue Feng, a U.S. geologist convicted this month of trading in Chinese state secrets, has appealed to a Beijing court to overturn his eight-year sentence, his lawyer said Friday.

The lawyer, Tong Wei, said Mr. Xue’s appeal challenges a Beijing Number One Intermediate People’s Court decision that the oil industry information he was dealing in should be considered a national secret. He also appealed against the harshness of the penalty, which included a fine, Mr. Tong said.

Appeals in China rarely succeed. Mr. Tong said he is unsure how the court will respond.

Mr. Xue was first detained in late 2007 on allegations, outlined during his sentencing July 5, that he had tried to broker a deal to sell energy market data, including the location and other details of about 30,000 Chinese oil wells, to his then-U.S. employer, Englewood, Colo.-based IHS Inc. In the case, Mr. Xue argued that such information is widely traded and available in the global oil industry and that he didn’t know it was secret in China.

© Paulina Hartono for China Digital Times (CDT), 2010. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: state secrets, Xue Feng
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During last week’s hearings by the United States-China Congressional Committee (USCC), the convergence between China’s new state secrets law, the Google controversy and the Rio Tinto case came into clear light.

China’s 2010 amendments to its state secrets law appear to have been an attempt to bring the country’s framework of laws into the 21st century, addressing concerns Beijing has about the role of the Internet in facilitating the spread of information that could potentially lead to social and political unrest.

It remains to be seen whether these amendments will simply provide much-needed clarification on the boundaries of what China considers “state secrets”, thereby simplifying how individuals and corporations navigate the murky waters of China’s many state-owned enterprises (SOE).

Many policymakers fear these new amendments will provide new mechanisms for Beijing to increase its heavy handed control of voices of dissent and may additionally further muddy the water between where the private and public sectors come together in China.

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2010. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Googlecn, Rio Tinto, state secrets
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Xue Feng, 44, a naturalized American who works for a U.S. energy consulting firm, was charged with trying to buy a database that reportedly showed the location and condition of oil and wells belonging to China’s government-owned National Petroleum Corp.

In other countries, such information would normally not be considered particularly sensitive. But China in recent years has shown a increasing willingness to use its catchall state secrecy laws — usually invoked in matters of national security — to protect what it considers the trade secrets of its state run companies, particularly in the all-important energy sector. In March Stern Hu, an Australian working for the mining firm Rio Tinto, was convicted in Shanghai of stealing commercial secrets and bribery relating to China’s iron ore purchases; Hu received a 10-year sentence.

Xue, who was arrested in November 2007, claimed he was tortured while in detention, including being burned on his arms with lit cigarettes and bashed in the head. His case had attracted high-level American attention, with President Obama raising his concerns when he visited China last year. The case was a test of the administration’s “quiet diplomacy” approach of bringing up human rights issues in China.

And from the Economist blog:

Criminal defendants in China enjoy little in the way of guaranteed access to legal counsel, rights to call their own witnesses, or the opportunity to challenge evidence and testimony against them. Seldom do Chinese criminal-court proceedings end with anything other than a guilty verdict. For the nine years ending in 2006, the national rate of conviction in first-instance criminal cases stood at over 99%.

Its predictable result notwithstanding, Mr Xue’s case was far from typical. For one thing, the American ambassador to China, Jon Huntsman, was in attendance at Beijing’s Number One Intermediate People’s Court when the sentence was announced. For another, the wheels of justice turned more slowly than usual this time. The verdict came down more than 31 months after Mr Xue’s initial detention in November 2007, after numerous false starts and postponements, in apparent violation of China’s own laws governing the time allowed for prosecutors to conclude a case.

Mr Xue’s family alleges that he was repeatedly beaten and tortured while in official custody—they say that police stubbed out cigarettes on his bare arms. Sadly the scenes they describe are all too common in cases like his.

See also an article from the New York Times.

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2010. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: espionage, state secrets, Xue Feng
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The amendment to the 21-year-old Protection of State Secrets Law, adopted Thursday by the standing committee of the National People’s Congress, explicitly extends requirements to Internet companies and telecommunications operators to cooperate with Chinese authorities in investigations into leaks of state secrets. If the companies discover the Internet or other public networks are being used to publish information that involves state secrets, the amended law requires them to report it to relevant authorities, halt the transmissions and preserve records of the activity.

The amendment, which takes effect Oct. 1, is part of a broader effort to strengthen government controls over information flows against challenges posed by technology. But its practical impact on business is likely to be limited. Authorities already have leeway to define state secrets and to punish alleged leaks. All telecom companies and Internet-service providers in China are state-run, and while the law covers private Internet-content companies—including the small number of foreign companies in the sector—they already are required to comply with state secrets rules and other Chinese laws.

The amended law also promotes the wider use of technical measures by government agencies to protect classified information, such as using firewalls and keeping drives with classified information off of public networks. According to a legislative investigation cited by the state-run Xinhua news agency last year, more than 70% of China’s state-secret leaks occur via the Internet.

Xinhua’s English report on the legislative session only makes a brief mention of the law:

Wu said, the Law on Guarding State Secrets has made clear legal liability in guarding state secrets, which will help safeguard the state security and interests.

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2010. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Internet regulation, legal reform, state secrets
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Internet operators and other public information network service providers should cooperate with public security and state security departments in probes of state secret leaks, according to a law amendment discussed Monday by lawmakers.

The amendments to the Law on Guarding State Secrets was submitted for its third reading at the four-day session of the National People’s Congress (NPC) Standing Committee, or the top legislature, which began Monday.

Laws or amendments usually go through three readings before being adopted by China’s top legislature.

Update: See also a New York Times report, “China Moves to Tighten Data Controls”:

The wording of the amendment, as cited by the state-controlled newspaper China Daily, suggested that Internet and telecommunications would have to take a more proactive stance in identifying leaks of state secrets and their sources. The newspaper said companies must detect, report and delete unauthorized disclosures.

…In a related move, the Chinese government Monday posted on a government Web site a broad definition of what constitutes a commercial secret, covering information related to strategic plans, management, mergers, equity trades, stock market listings, reserves, production, procurement and sales strategy, financing and finances, negotiations, joint venture investments and technology transfers.

Read more about state secrets laws in China via CDT.

© cctvcctv for China Digital Times (CDT), 2010. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Internet regulation, state secrets
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The 1988 legislation needs an immediate reshuffle. It is a poorly conceived work of jurisprudence because it allows state organs and their functionaries virtually unlimited authority in defining and maintaining so-called “state secrets”.

Under the current law’s definition of a “state secret”, official establishments and their staff can easily stick that label to everything they want to hide from the public.

Even township officials can classify information in the name of the state. Such information, once classified, can be withheld forever.

Each of these major defects will, to a degree, be modified in the proposed revisions, which is why we are anxious to see them pass legislative scrutiny.

Read more about the state secrets law via CDT.

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2010. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: legal reform, state secrets
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Two years after disappearing into custody, the University of Chicago-trained Xue (pronounced shway) remains held at an unknown location in Beijing, charged with stealing state secrets over the purchase of a commercial database on the oil industry. His case has been batted inconclusively between prosecutors and the courts, which twice asked for more evidence, according to a summary of the case prepared by Xue’s wife and seen by The Associated Press.

On Tuesday, President Barack Obama raised Xue’s case at his Beijing summit with Chinese President Hu Jintao, said a White House official on the trip, in the latest and highest-level intervention.

More than an instance of abusive, intransigent Chinese justice, Xue’s case raises disturbing questions about the quiet lobbying foreign governments, companies and the families of detainees often use, believing it more effective with an authoritarian Chinese leadership.

“Under difficult and dangerous circumstances, Dr. Xue made it clear that he wanted the American people to learn of his ordeal. I have little doubt that had his wishes been respected, his case would have already been resolved,” said John Kamm, a human rights campaigner with a two-decade track record of getting prisoners released and whom the State Department turned to this month for help.

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2009. | Permalink | 3 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: espionage, state secrets, Xue Feng
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Those charges have yet to be elaborated upon. Meanwhile, an official of the National Administration for the Protection of State Secrets in China has alleged that Rio’s “spying” cost the nation $100 billion in higher iron ore prices.

The claim does not stand up to the most casual scrutiny of trade data. China’s total imports of iron ore over that period were only $168 billion, of which only about 20 percent was from Rio. China was paying the same negotiated prices as Japanese, Korean and other importers. And China’s own mines, which provide more than 50 percent of its needs, were using similar price benchmarks, or selling on the spot market, where prices have been mostly higher than the negotiated ones.

The nonsensical claim was made in an article by an official not directly involved in the spying case, but it was immediately trumpeted by the official news agency Xinhua, as well as by media across China and around the world. Although the article is no longer on the Web site, its claims have not been corrected and its imprint on Chinese minds will not disappear. Meanwhile, foreigners are left wondering when it may be their turn to be subject to blasts of xenophobia or become pawns in power and money struggles between different mainland agencies.

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2009. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: foreign companies, Rio Tinto, state secrets
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A state secrets trial of a Chinese dissident who criticized the government’s response to a massive earthquake last year ended Wednesday after half a day, with no immediate ruling, his wife said.

About 50 supporters and relatives of Huang Qi tried to attend his trial in Chengdu in southwestern Sichuan but were barred from entering the court by police, said Zeng Li, Huang’s wife, in a phone interview. She said her husband’s health has been deteriorating in recent months while in detention.

Huang, 45, long one of China’s most outspoken activists, ran a human rights Web site and wrote about parents who had lost their children when badly built schools collapsed in the May 2008 quake that left nearly 90,000 people dead or missing.

© Liu Yong for China Digital Times (CDT), 2009. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: activists, huang qi, state secrets
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