The following censorship instructions, issued to the media by government authorities, have been leaked and distributed online.
State Council Information Office: All websites are to delete the article “Three Years of Outside Services: Letter to the Beijing Shouwang Church Congregation” and related commentary. (April 16, 2014)
国信办：各网清理删除《户外敬拜三周年之际 北京守望教会 告会众书》一文及相关评论。
Shouwang, an unregistered Protestant church, began holding services in public after it was evicted from the restaurant where it had been meeting. “House churches” are not registered with the government, and as such usually congregate secretly.
Read Shouwang’s letter via CDT Chinese [zh].
Chinese journalists and bloggers often refer to these instructions as “Directives from the Ministry of Truth.”
CDT collects directives from a variety of sources and checks them against official Chinese media reports to confirm their implementation.
Since directives are sometimes communicated orally to journalists and editors, who then leak them online, the wording published here may not be exact. The original publication date on CDT Chinese is noted after the directives; the date given may indicate when the directive was leaked, rather than when it was issued. CDT does its utmost to verify dates and wording, but also takes precautions to protect the source.
