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By Jonathan Chin / Staff writer
Foreign journalists last year faced an increasingly “challenging and restrictive” environment that comprised the “new abnormal” in China, a report released on Monday by the Foreign Correspondents’ Club in China (FCCC) said.
China is one of the most challenging environments globally for reporters, an assessment the group confirmed in its latest survey, it said.
Of 89 correspondents polled, 94 percent said that reporting conditions in China usually did not meet or had never met global standards, it said.
Photo: CNA
About 64 percent of respondents reported that Chinese officials or police had obstructed their work at least once, 40 percent faced obstruction by unidentified people and 8 percent reported being subjected to physical force, the group said.
The poll showed that 23 percent of respondents reported that their sources faced questioning, intimidation or other negative repercussions after speaking to foreign reporters, the FCCC said.
Foreign journalists could be detained, questioned or harassed by Chinese officials or police almost everywhere in China, with those covering Tibet, Xinjiang, border zones or other sensitive regions facing heightened risks, it said.
In addition, 47 percent of respondents reported expanding red lines on subjects that could not be broached or an increase in the harshness of their enforcement, the report said.
Many correspondents shared the view “everything can become sensitive” in China’s current reporting environment, including demographics, youth unemployment and the real-estate crisis, it said.
About 77 percent of respondents reported that some sources declined or canceled interviews because they were not permitted to speak to foreign journalists, the group said.
Business owners, academics, economists and agricultural experts were covertly or overtly pressured not to speak with foreign reporters, a correspondent was cited as saying.
China retaliated against foreign correspondents for stories they disliked and effectively held reporters as accountable for anything their media outlet published on China or Taiwan, the group said.
Starting this year, Chinese authorities have enhanced their use of threats against journalists reporting on Taiwan, it said.
China expelled New York Times correspondent Vivian Wang (王月眉) in retaliation for the publication of a video showing President William Lai (賴清德) at a business summit, the group said.
The survey concluded that “restrictions on reporting are no longer experienced as isolated incidents but as a routine feature of life for foreign journalists in China,” it said.
The annual poll of reporting conditions was conducted in February and March, and survey respondents were drawn from the FCCC’s 176 members, it said.
