China Steps Up Attack on Western Media Over Tibet Coverage

As the crackdown in Tibet continues to draw attention from the world’s media, China has intensified its effort to discredit Western media’s coverage of Tibet, accusing them of bias and distortion.

Chinese officials have criticized Western media for allegedly distorting the facts and slandering the Chinese government’s “legitimate” actions; while state media have highlighted inconsistencies in some media reports, in a bid to cast doubt on their credibility.

Ethnic Tibetan official “indignant”

Former Vice-Chairman of the National People’s Congress (NPC) Standing Committee Raidi, who is ethnic Tibetan, was “indignant” over Western media’s “outrageous” and “ill-motivated” coverage of the Lhasa riots, Xinhua news agency reported on 19 March.

Raidi was quoted as saying: “Some Western media purposely distorted the facts and viciously described severe crime as peaceful demonstration, so as to slander our legitimate efforts to keeping social stability as violent crackdown.”

“Without knowing even the basic facts about the crime made by rioters,” he said, “some Western media posed as hypocrites to clamorously advise the Chinese government not to suppress peaceful demonstration and to respect human rights.”

Spokesman: Some reports “grossly inconsistent” with facts

At a routine press conference on 21 March, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang criticized Western media coverage of the situation in Tibet, and urged them to be “objective and fair” in their reporting.

According to the Foreign Ministry website, Qin said: “We are aware of the heightened interest foreign media have shown in the violent incidents in Lhasa and other areas and their extensive coverage of these incidents for several days in a row. Some of the reports are objective, while others are grossly inconsistent with the facts. We hope the media will act responsibly, respect the facts, and report the news in an objective and fair manner in accordance with the professional code of conduct for journalists.”

Xinhua condemns “deep-rooted bias”

Official Xinhua news agency published a commentary on 21 March, criticizing Western media for “swinging behind a few ‘rights groups’” in their coverage of the Tibet crackdown.

The commentary said that Xinhua’s admission on 20 March that Chinese police had opened fire and wounded four rioters in Sichuan Province had been “amplified in a most incredible way” by human rights groups and Western media.

“Out of a deep-rooted bias, they refused to believe China’s official media and the Chinese government,” said the article.

It repeated the authorities’ claim that 13 civilians had been killed by rioters, including five young women who had allegedly died in fires rioters had started, and asked, “Who was there to claim their rights?”

Internet users blast “biased”, “dishonest” reports

China’s official English-language newspaper China Daily said on 22 March that Chinese Internet users had been “angered” by “biased and sometimes dishonest” reports by some Western media.

The report gave examples of apparent mistakes in some Western media reports on Tibet. One report was said to have included a photo showing Indian police dragging a man away, but the caption wrongly stated that they were Chinese troops.

Another news website was accused of publishing a photo of Chinese military trucks which had been cropped, cutting off the half of the picture showing a crowd of rioters throwing rocks at the trucks.

The China Daily report quoted one Internet user as saying, “To tarnish China’s image, the West is doing whatever they can, no mater how mean and vicious.”

Another online posting said, “Is this what they call Western democracy and freedom of speech?”

Xinhua news agency reported on 23 March that tens of thousands of Chinese Internet users had condemned Western media for “distorting facts”. They said some Western media had “intentionally neglected cruelties of the mobsters, revealing the hypocrisy of ‘objectivity and fairness’ they had flaunted”.

Sources: As listed

(c) 2008 BBC Monitoring Asia Pacific. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.