China Daily reports that the All-China Journalists Association is investigating the police threat against Wen Liang, a reporter who wrote critical reports about a biotech company in Shandong:
The ACJA said on Monday it is listening to all the parties involved in the case, in which police in East China’s Shandong province went to Beijing to examine the circumstances surrounding a journalist’s negative news report.
The Beijing-based China Youth Daily reported that Wen, who previously filed a story on a biotech company in Laiyang that “cheated” to gain financing, was maintaining a low profile in his hometown in Southwest China’s Sichuan province and had not returned to Beijing to meet with the police due to “fear and anger” over the investigation.
…According to Jia, although there appeared to be a rising number of incidents in which the police had either challenged or obstructed news reporting, there is not enough objective evidence to conclude that police intervention has become a trend.
The director of the general office of Laiyang public security bureau, who only gave his surname as Wang, rejected China Daily’s request for an interview on Monday.
The website qianlong.com published Wen’s story on July 21, saying Shandong Hilead Biotechnology Co Ltd “brags about its technology, fabricates sales channels, exaggerates its market, invents its profits and plays up returns…” in the promotional literature on equity financing that it sent to scores of investors.
Wen told the China Youth Daily that he received his information on the story from a confidential source.
