Beijing Olympics 2008: Winning Press Freedom - World Press ...
Beijing Olympics 2008: Winning Press Freedom - World Press ...
Beijing Olympics 2008: Winning Press Freedom - World Press ...
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<strong>Beijing</strong> <strong>Olympics</strong> <strong>2008</strong>: <strong>Winning</strong> <strong>Press</strong> <strong>Freedom</strong><br />
84<br />
This control takes several forms. One is to block foreign web sites and jam their radio<br />
transmissions. The BBC Chinese service, which has been broadcasting since 1941, is<br />
constantly subject to this kind of interference.<br />
Currently, we broadcast four hours a day to China on the short waves, with a mixture of<br />
news and current affairs programs and feature programs on education, British life, sport<br />
and entertainment.<br />
We also have two web sites: bbcchinese.com, which is a news site, and bbcchina.com, which<br />
is an education site.<br />
At the moment, our short wave transmissions are constantly jammed in China, and our<br />
news web site is blocked as well, but the education site (bbcchina.com) is accessible in<br />
China.<br />
Recently, the BBC News site in English has been unblocked, along with some other web<br />
sites (such as Wikipedia).<br />
I want to stress here that this kind of censorship is effective, but never 100 per cent so.<br />
Our loyal and persistent listeners can try to switch to different frequencies to listen to our<br />
programs, and in some parts of China, people can hear us quite clearly.<br />
Regarding our web site bbcchinese.com, many people in China can use other means to get<br />
to us, so the blocking is never entirely effective; I recently asked several well-respected<br />
scholars if they can access our web site, and they tell me very confidently that they can if<br />
they want to.<br />
Nevertheless, it does interfere with people’s normal listening and reading habits, which<br />
means that we can’t reach our audience in as freely as we hope, and our interaction with<br />
our audience is severely restricted.<br />
In January 2005, after the death of the former party secretary, Zhao Ziyang, we had a<br />
phone-in program to talk about his legacy. One young caller told us that if it were not for<br />
the reports he had heard on the BBC after Zhao had died, he wouldn’t have known that<br />
Zhao Ziyang was such an important figure in recent history and did so much for China’s<br />
reform; he learned from school that Zhao was one of those responsible for the troubles<br />
during the 1989 turmoil. In fact, we had broadcast several series about 1989 student<br />
movement and often interviewed about Zhao Ziyang and others, but obviously this young<br />
man had had no access to this information.<br />
Apart from blocking and jamming, we also have to deal with official interventions or<br />
complaints about our programs. From time to time, we get phone calls or letters from the<br />
Chinese officials complaining about our coverage of Falun Gong, Taiwan or East Turkistan<br />
[Xinjiang] separatist movement.<br />
As program makers, we need to go to China and interview people; and we need to apply<br />
for a journalist visa. Sometimes we get it, sometimes not. In the past years, applications<br />
to make a series about Mao Zedong, about Chinese media reforms and about petitioners’<br />
situation were all denied.