China Police violence against foreign journalists to cover the street protest in Beijing

Police officers roughed up foreign journalists trying to cover a protest yesterday on Beijing’s Wangfujing Street, including a Bloomberg News reporter who was badly beaten by plainclothes security men and had to be hospitalized with a head injury. Cameras were seized in order to delete photos and video. A dozen journalists were held for several hours in a police station. Media and websites including TV5, CNN and Linkedin were censored.

Inspired by the “Jasmine Revolution” pro-democracy demonstrations in Tunisia and elsewhere, the Beijing demonstration had been announced in advance on the Internet but hundreds of uniformed and plainclothes police officers, accompanied by police dogs, were deployed in major show of force to prevent it from taking place.

Falun Gong Practitioner in Northern China Dies from Labor Camp Torture

NEW YORK–A Falun Gong practitioner from Hebei province died on February 20, 2011, four days after labor camp officials sent him home on the verge of death, the Falun Dafa Information Center has learned.

Sources inside China report that Mr. Pei Yangqing (裴彦庆) was sent home on February 16, 2011 from Qinhuangdao Re-education Through Labor (RTL) Camp. His chest was covered in bruises and he was incontinent. Four days later, unable to recover from the torture inflicted on him in the camp, Pei passed away.

Heavy Charges for Chinese Activists before the Jasmine Rallies Call Appeared on Internet

A few days before the Jasmine Rallies called for by Chinese organizers to be held in 23 cities on Sunday, February 27, the Chinese authorities have charged many activists with serious state security crimes, including “subversion of state power” and “inciting subversion of state power.” Those charged include three Sichuan activists: public intellectual Ran Yunfei (冉云飞), rights activists Chen Wei (陈卫), and Ding Mao (丁矛); Jiangsu rights activist Hua Chunhui (华春辉); and Harbin-based blogger Liang Haiyi (梁海怡), who goes by the penname Miaoxiao (渺小).

China detains, censors bloggers on ‘Jasmine Revolution’

New York, February 25, 2011– China’s censors tightened Internet controls and security officials harassed and detained writers and activists in the wake of an online appeal for a “Jasmine Revolution” in China, according to international human rights groups and news reports. The apparent crackdown came in advance of two top legislative meetings, the National People’s Congress and the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, scheduled for March.

Censors blocked the word “jasmine” after overseas dissident-run news website Boxun and Chinese Twitter users broadcast calls on February 19 to mobilize street protests modeled on recent unrest in the Middle East, according to international news reports. (Twitter is generally blocked in China but accessible to users of proxy networks based overseas.) Only a handful of protesters appeared, although calls continued for government protests characterized as “strolls” to continue every Sunday around China, according to The Associated Press.

Censorship reaches new heights in China

Reporters Without Borders today denounced the Chinese government’s “gagging” of the population with increased censorship and other “unacceptable practices” that it said seemed to aim at “stamping out all forms of freedom of expression.”

Even as China became the planet’s second biggest economy, it still suffered from very serious environmental pollution and the authorities were targeting human rights campaigners by investing in the world’s most sophisticated censorship apparatus, known as “The Great Firewall,” the press freedom organisation said.

Six western energy companies Hacked Through China Internet Servers, including Exxon, Shell, BP

Computer hackers working through Internet servers in China broke into and stole proprietary information from the networks of six U.S. and European energy companies, including Exxon Mobil Corp., Royal Dutch Shell Plc and BP Plc, according to one of the companies and investigators who declined to be identified.

McAfee Inc., a cyber-security firm, reported Feb. 10 that such attacks had resulted in the loss of “project-financing information with regard to oil and gas field bids and operations.” In its report, Santa Clara, California-based McAfee, assisted by other cyber-security firms, didn’t identify the energy companies targeted. The attacks, which it dubbed “Night Dragon,” originated “primarily in China” and occurred during the past three years.

Fear of Middle East-style democracy movement, China charges subversion for Internet User’s protest repostings

BEIJING — China filed subversion charges against Internet users who reposted a call for protests as the authoritarian government enforced its crackdown against any Middle East-style democracy movement, activists said.

In addition to well-known activists who apparently remained in custody after being taken away ahead of the planned protests on Sunday, at least three people were detained on charges of “inciting subversion of state power,” according to the Hong Kong-based Information Center for Human Rights and Democracy. China often uses the vaguely worded charge to lock up outspoken government critics.

In a nod to social stability concerns, China’s Vice President Xi Jinping on Wednesday urged greater outreach by the ruling Communist Party to handle issues related to education, employment, health care and housing.

Social networking website LinkedIn Is Blocked in China

Feb. 24 (Bloomberg) — LinkedIn Corp., the networking website for professionals, said its service was being blocked in parts of China and that it was looking into the matter.

Just-ping.com and WebSitePulse — services that monitor website accessibility around the world — said earlier that the site wasn’t available in cities including Shanghai and Beijing.

China, the world’s largest Internet market with 457 million Web users, has shut out sites such as those operated by Facebook Inc., Twitter Inc. and Google Inc.’s YouTube since 2009 to block the flow of information on politically sensitive subjects. LinkedIn’s focus on business professionals seeking jobs has shielded it from the same fate as those sites.

Austria’s foreign minister meets with China activist Ai Weiwei

VIENNA — Austria’s Foreign Minister Michael Spindelegger met with Chinese activist and artist Ai Weiwei Thursday during an official visit to Beijing.

The 45-minute talk with Ai, one of China’s most famous artists and a bold political activist, was initially kept under wraps by the Austrian delegation, which was also meeting with China’s leadership during the three-day visit.

Ai however made the meeting public in a posting on the Internet.

During the encounter, the artist spoke of the repressive measures taken against him, Spindelegger told the Austria Press Agency from Beijing.

WSJ: China’s Hooligan Government

Chairman Mao said that power grows out of the barrel of the gun, and Chinese authorities have never shied away from using violence against anyone who has stepped out of line. But this wet work was usually sanctioned by quasi-legal procedures and carried out far from the public eye—for instance in the country’s vast system of labor camps.

In recent years, however, thugs acting on behalf of various levels of government have begun openly attacking Chinese who dare to complain, as well as local and foreign journalists who record those grievances. This portends a breakdown in public respect for the state’s authority that will be self-defeating for the central government.

Fears grow after Chinese human rights lawyer Tang Jitian detained

Friends of a human rights lawyer detained by police after seeking to help another legal activist say they are gravely concerned.

Tang Jitian was seized by police in Beijing on Wednesday following a lunch with other lawyers to discuss how they could support Chen Guangcheng, a grassroots advocate released from prison last year but currently living under house arrest.

Other activists said police had prevented them from attending the meeting.

Congressional Battle Brewing Over VOA Mandarin Service (to China) Cuts

A fight may be brewing in the U.S. Congress over plans announced this week to end the Voice of America’s shortwave broadcasting to China.

Prominent conservatives have spoken out against the plan, which would see VOA move all its Mandarin-language services to the Internet. In addition, a Democratic member of Congress told VOA Wednesday he will urge the speaker of the House of Representatives to block the plan.

The proposal was part of the U.S. government international broadcaster’s proposed budget for the coming year, which also includes plans to shut down VOA’s Cantonese and Croatian-language services.

VOA radio broadcasts to China signing off, while China boosts propaganda

By Bill Gertz, The Washington Times-

The Obama administration will cancel shortwave radio broadcasts by Voice of America into China this year, as Beijing is expanding its propaganda operations in the United States and around the world.

Critics of the broadcasting cuts, announced Monday, said major reductions in staff and shortwave broadcasts will sharply curtail an important outlet for unfiltered news and information for large numbers of people in China, especially areas such as Tibet and western Xinjiang province, where pro-democracy forces are opposing Chinese rule.

Foreign reporters roughed up near China activist Chen Guangcheng’s home

By Pascale Trouillaud (AFP)-

BEIJING — Foreign reporters were roughed up this week as they tried to reach blind human rights activist Chen Guangcheng, who is under house arrest in eastern China, journalists said Wednesday.

Chen, a self-taught lawyer who gained world attention by exposing abuses in China’s “one-child” population control policy, has been under harsh restrictions since completing a more than four-year jail sentence in September.

“We were roughly pushed away from Chen’s home” by about a dozen men, said Brice Pedroletti, a journalist with French newspaper Le Monde.

U.S. State Department Faces Egyptian-Style Failure Over China

By Stephen Gregory, Epoch Times Staff, Feb 15, 2011-

When events in Egypt began to gather momentum, the U.S. State Department (DOS) was caught flat-footed. U.S. officials had been relying on their contacts with Mubarak’s regime and had not been talking to the people of Egypt. But in the end, the people of Egypt decided the course of events, and the United States could only be a bystander.

Falun Gong practitioners wonder whether DOS’s Office of Chinese and Mongolian Affairs—more commonly known as the China Desk—is not making the same mistake regarding the Chinese regime. Practitioners renounce violence in all its forms and are not interested in political power. But the Chinese Communist Party considers Falun Gong to be the greatest challenge to its rule.

Ages of Chinese skaters in question

CHINA is facing new questions about the ages of some of its athletes after discrepancies were found in the birthdates of nine figure skaters.

According to a list of birthdates published on the Chinese Skating Association’s website and found by The Associated Press, the skaters violated the sport’s age limits by competing when they were either too young or too old.

The birthdates on the federation’s websites differ from those listed on the athletes’ International Skating Union biographies.

China won’t take the Egypt route

Despite Beijing’s efforts to prevent it, there is not a thoughtful person in China who has not been asking these past few days how their country compares with Egypt.

The parallels include fast economic growth accompanied by widening inequalities, systematic corruption and a crisis of injustice.

The distinction that matters, which makes a Chinese people’s uprising a practical impossibility, is that the Chinese Communist Party is a more professional and well-resourced dictatorship.

Man Arrested After Attacking Chinese New Year Parade Banner in New York

NEW YORK—A Chinese man was arrested after jumping the railing and destroying a banner carried by participants in the annual Chinese New Year Parade in Flushing on Saturday, Feb. 12.

“Around noon, at the intersection between Sanford Ave and Main Street, next to a Chinatown eyewear company, a Chinese male rushed out of the crowd and ran into the Falun Gong parade procession,” says Mr. Dong, who was on the scene.

Chinese Hosting Company Named In Cyber Attacks On U.S. Oil Companies

(The Hosting News) – Song Zhiyue, a technician for the website hosting company Science and Technology Internet, in northeaster Shandong province of China was recently named by McAfee in relation to attack against U.S. oil and gas companies over the past years. In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, Zhiyue stated over the phone “What? You’re sure it’s my company?”

McAfee’s report found that hackers broke into computers of these companies in the Unites States, Taiwan, Greece, and Kazakhstan and regularly stole private information about bidding, operations, and the company’s finances. Their was no information regarding China’s state owned oil companies benefitting from the attacks or information received.

China artist cancels ‘politically sensitive’ show

BEIJING — Chinese artist Ai Weiwei said Monday he cancelled his first large solo exhibition in mainland China after organisers told the outspoken government critic the timing was too politically sensitive.

Ai, one of China’s most famous artists and a bold political activist, told AFP his show was due to start in March at UCCA, a gallery founded by Belgian collector Guy Ullens in a Beijing art district.

“The timing is sensitive and politically they feel it is not suitable at the moment,” said the 53-year-old.

China’s Social Media Used to Find Missing Children

In China, social media such as microblogs and instant messaging services, are tightly controlled, to prevent the spread of information the government does not like. But some Chinese are learning to use social media to reunite families.

In an emotional scene, Peng Gaofeng is reunited with his son, who was abducted three years ago, when he was just three.

Child abduction is a big problem in China with thousands of children disappearing each year. The government seems powerless to help distraught parents.

Chinese Insider Reveals Why the CCP Sent Troops During the Korean War

By Qin Xin, Epoch Times Staff, Feb 11, 2011-

On Feb. 8, the two Koreas resumed discussions in Panmunjom, where stalemated peace talks ended the Korean War 60 years ago. Although time has long since cleared the smoke of the war, the vast majority of Chinese people are still deceived by the lies about the war invented by the Chinese Communists, as that is all that is written in Mainland China’s textbooks.

But after some casual chats about the Korean War with an elderly overseas Chinese some surprising inside information has come to light.

Chinese Human rights lawyer beaten by police over secret video of his house arrest

Reporters Without Borders, Feb 11, 2011-

A famous self-taught human rights lawyer and free speech activist, Chen Guangcheng, has reportedly been badly beaten by police for circulating a secretly-recorded video showing how he is being held under house arrest in his small farm in the eastern province of Shandong.

He is said to be confined to his bed as a result of the injuries received in the beating but has not been able to receive any medical treatment. His wife, Yuan Weijing, was also beaten.