VisitCHN

6 May 2009

We have received three separate, confirmed reports today of journalists being physically attacked in Sichuan. Nobody has been hurt but equipment has been broken. The details are below. Given the violence of the encounters and an apparent increasing frequency of reports, it seems the situation is becoming more volatile and we advise extra caution when visiting these areas.

REPORTING INTERFERENCE INCIDENTS
The FCCC has logged more than 335 cases of reporting interference since January 1, 2007. This includes over 60 cases during the Olympic period, more than 40 cases after the unrest in Tibet on March 14 and more than 12 after the Sichuan earthquake on May 12. “Reporting interference” includes violence, destruction of journalistic materials, detention, harassment of sources and staff, interception of communications, denial of access to public areas, being questioned in an intimidating manner by authorities, being reprimanded officially, being followed, and being subjected to other obstacles not in keeping with international practices. The Olympic period begins with the  formal opening of the Olympic media center on July 25. Click here for FCCC recommendations to improve the reporting environment.

BEIJING: CAUTION NEEDED IN SICHUAN AFTER THREE VIOLENT INCIDENTS

MAY 6, 2009 – We have received three separate, confirmed reports today of journalists being physically attacked in Sichuan. Nobody has been hurt but equipment has been broken. The details are below. Given the violence of the encounters and an apparent increasing frequency of reports, it seems the situation is becoming more volatile and we advise extra caution when visiting these areas.

1)  Katri Makkonen, a journalist with Finnish TV, was pushed and shoved while attempting to report in Fuxin, Deyang County. She said 10 people in plain clothes attempted to grab her team’s equipment and to drag the cameraman out of the car. The assailants broke a microphone in the scuffle. Nobody was hurt. The TV crew were followed when they left. “We almost lost our camera. It was very violent,” said Makkonen. “People should be very careful there.”

2)  Jamil Anderlini of the Financial Times reported two violent incidents in Sichuan within less than 24 hours. In the first, on May 5, his crew was stopped from reporting in Fuxin while attempting to interview parents of children who died in the earthquake. An unidentified man tried to grab Anderlini’s video camera, then punched him in the arm. The FT crew retreated to its car after being surrounded by 10-12 men, one of whom then tried to punch the Chinese news assistant through a half-open car window. Uniformed police eventually broke up the scene and the team was followed out of town.

3)  On May 6, the FT journalists arrived at the Mianyang government office to pick up its local reporting passes where they saw a local woman petitioning outside. When Anderlini attempted to film an interview with the woman, an unidentified man arrived and ripped the video camera from its tripod, tearing off the bottom of the camera. Anderlini asked the local propaganda office for compensation, but was told police would have to handle it. The team left the area.

The propaganda office told the FT police could stop any interview for any reason, and that “the reason the police were so violent with us was they were trying to protect us from the petitioner.”

YINGXIU, SICHUAN PROVINCE: GERMAN REPORTING ON SICHUAN QUAKE AFTERMATH BARRED FROM YINGXIU
APRIL 2, 2009 – I was talking to relatives of victims of the Sichuan earthquake schools at the public cemetery (gong mu) above the ruins of Yingxiu. The cemetary was full of Chinese journalists taking photos and relatives mourning. I was a silent bystander until some relatives approached me and insisted on telling me their story.

I was apprehended by one plainclothes official and one policeman while talking to relatives of schoolteachers and children who died in Yingxiu elementary school on May 12, 2008. I was told that I had no right to be in Yingxiu and that I should have obtained permission before coming. I was then led away from the public cemetery, made to fill out a form to “register,” and told to leave Yingxiu immediately. A plainclothes agent escorted me to the car and also took down the driver’s details.

Throughout the incident the official remained very polite and friendly, and I did as I was told without resistance. Before arriving in Yingxiu I had tried to obtain permission by calling the Sichuan Province waiban foreign affairs office, the Chengdu waiban and the Aba local waiban repeatedly over several days. Nobody had mentioned the need to obtain permission. They had only informed me that the special permit (te qu zheng) for the disaster area was not being issued anymore.

MINJIANG COMMUNE, DUJIANGYUAN: FRENCH REPORTER DETAINED, SOURCE INTIMIDATED REPORTING ON AFTERMATH OF SICHUAN EARTHQUAKE

APRIL 1, 2009 - I went to the home of a family that lost their daughter in the earthquake when her school collapsed. The couple, the driver and I drove about one kilometer to the location where their village will be rebuilt.

On the way we stopped to look at a public propaganda billboard showing the estate project. A speeding, unmarked car slammed on its breaks and skided in front of our car, blocking our way. It was followed by a police car and a second unmarked car. Three plainclothes officials and two police officers came out and surrounded us. A plainclothes officer asked for everyone’s ID. He then asked me to register by filling in a detailed form.

I asked who he was, he said he was with ‘Gongan,’ the Public Security Bureau . When I asked why I should register, he said “in your country if police ask you to register, you have to register,” without giving reasons for the arrest. I asked if it was illegal to be here, he said no. I asked if I did anything illegal, he said he stopped me for my ‘safety’, stating that it was a dangerous place after the quake.

The two other plainclothes officers approached and introduced themselves as the heads of the local PSB. It was 16.45 and they had a very strong smell of alcohol. They behaved agressively. They took the couple and shouted at them, then released them.

They then saw that I have a journalist visa, and took the driver and me to a nearby police station. After several phone calls and cups of tea, they asked for my journalist card. I had left it at the hotel. After further other phone calls, they said could release me if I gave the number of my press card. I gave it to them. After further calls, they said that the Waiban foreign affairs officials were coming, and we had to wait for them. I asked why, they replied because they couldn’t speak english (we were speaking fluently in chinese for 90 minutes, and were even writing in Chinese.)

Three different people interrogated me about my conversation with the couple and how I knew them. Meanwhile, they interrogated my driver in a separate room. Three young officials arrived later on, and asked me again the same questions. They said I was detained because I was in a “forbidden area,” though it is a tourist spot, with propaganda banners welcoming ‘friends from all over the world’ and strongly promoting “tourism, for the people, by the people.” The local PSB chief explained “if a Chinese journalist went to Mr. Sarkozy’s office, he should register.”

After a third interrogation session by polite Waiban officials and more phone calls and tea, they had me sign a detailed form in Chinese. It even stated parts of my conversation with the couple that I hadn’t mentioned to them. Since there was nothing in the form against the couple, the driver or me, I signed it. The Waiban official head then offered to provide me with “comprehensive and official” written material about relocation and allowances in the area, and to come back anytime I want to conduct interviews, provided I register with them and follow their guidance.

Finally, the Waiban and Gongan cars escorted our car to the next city. On the way, the driver stopped at the couple’s house to retrieve a teacup he had forgotten. The PSB officer first stopped him, then escorted him inside. The driver later told me they barred him from talking with the couple. A text message later sent to the couple remain unanswered. The whole detention lasted about 3.5 hours.

Comments: Conducting my reporting prior to the incident. I actually had a positive impression about the relocation and allowance system: the couple told me that although they were distressed by the earthquake, they were well compensated, and the government system of relief was relatively transparent and efficient. Other new housing estates I saw were well constucted, other people interviewed were generally satisfied with the allowances and relocations. But after the detention, I started to have doubts, and had a very bad overall impression. If they had let me do my job and hadn’t harassed my sources, I would probably have written a much more positive article. Also, during my detention, several refugees came to the police station to sort out their problems (disputes, administrative duties etc.) Although some of their issues seemed urgent, the police didn’t give them priority. My detention was also a waste of personnel resources and time that could have been used for the sake of the local people. The Foreign Affaris officials were aware of the regulations and used them against me. I carried only my passport and journalist visa, but didn’t carry my press card.

NANYANG, HENAN PROVINCE: JOURNALIST REPORTING ON HOUSE CHURCH, SOURCES DETAINED

NOVEMBER 28, 2008 – The Christian Science Monitor correspondent, Peter Ford, was detained and questioned for three hours after the police broke up a house church meeting he had been reporting on with his assistant.

Around 15 people including uniformed and plainclothes police, Religious Affairs Bureau officials and a man who said he was from the Waiban (but offered no identification) raided the house church at around 9.30 in the morning and took Peter and his assistant to the Jin Di Yuan Hotel. In a room there police took his passport and press card details and (they said) checked them against an online data base. Peter was told that he had been attending an “unlawful gathering” and subjected to intermittent questioning by the “Waiban” representative (who behaved more like a policeman) about his motives for being in Nanyang, how he had contacted the house church, what he had talked about with its members, and so on. A Religious Affairs Bureau official took notes of the questions and answers and at one point a photographer took pictures of Peter with the note-taker.

The questioning was polite, and at no time was Peter asked to hand over his notes or video. He was driven to Nanyang airport in time to catch the plane to Beijing he had intended to take.

The leader of the house church, Zhang Mingxuan, whom Peter had interviewed at length the day before, had been arrested at around 7.30 that morning. He phoned Peter on Friday evening to say that he and his wife had been held in another hotel until 17.00 and then released even though he had refused to sign a document officially abolishing the “House Church Alliance” he had founded. More than a dozen church members were apparently detained in a local police station until 13.00.

SHANGQIU COUNTY, HENAN PROVINCE: BELGIAN TV CREW DRAGGED FROM VAN, BEATEN AND ROBBED

27 November 2008 — Belgian VRT journalist Tom Van de Weghe, his cameraman and assistant were beaten up and robbed of tapes, phones and money as they attempted to report on HIV-Aids in Henan province.

Eight thugs pulled their van over, reached inside to unlock the doors, dragged the crew on to the road and punched them into submission. “I thought they were going to kill us,” said Van de Weghe. “One of them gave me a heavy blow to the head. They acted like animals. It was terrifying.”

Earlier in the day, the reporters had been questioned by a policeman. Soon after, they were followed by two unmarked cars. After several hours, they were stopped again, surrounded and forced to hand over a tape. Locals said the thugs in this incident were Zhoukou and Gangshan county officials.

The journalists tried to return to the airport, but their van was pulled over a third time on a dark road, where the violent assault took place. The reporters were beaten until they handed over their tapes, identity cards and belongings.

The thugs stole 1800 yuan from Van de Weghe’s wallet as well as his tapes, mobile phone, camera and memory cards. Two days after the attack, he is still suffering from headaches caused by the blows.

A local man told the reporters the same thugs had earlier beaten Chinese journalists and Aids activists, including Li Dan. The locals said the thugs were officials working for Shuangmiao village and Shangqiu county. The leader of the gang was called Dong. Van de Weghe noted down their Shangqiu license plate number 66132.

VRT has lodged a protest at the Chinese embassy in Brussels, demanding compensation for the damages incurred; apologies to the journalist and his crew and to the VRT; and a guarantee that the VRT journalist can resume his work safely in accordance with international protocols and the principles of the freedom of press.

FCCC Statement: Government must punish the Henan thugs who beat up Belgian TV crew The Foreign Correspondents’ Club of China is appalled by the violent attack on the Belgian TV crew and calls on the central government to track down and punish those responsible. “This illegal and brutal act is a disgrace to Henan and to China,” said Jonathan Watts, president of the FCCC. “If the government is serious about the rule of law and opening to the media, the culprits must be caught and punished. There is enough evidence to identify the perpetrators. The central authorities should send a clear message that local governments must not use thugs to intimidate journalists.”

The incident occurred about a month after the government announced new regulations for foreign reporters. According to the new rules, China “adopts a basic state policy of opening up to the outside world” and “protects the lawful rights” of foreign journalists.

LINYI, SHANDONG PROVINCE: JOURNALIST DOING PARALYMPICS STORY ON BLIND ACTIVIST FOLLOWED, SOURCE DETAINED

September 11, 2008 — Australia Network reporter Charlotte Glennie was prevented by a group of unidentified people from interviewing Yuan Weijing, the wife of blind legal activist Chen Guangcheng. She said the group stopped her at a turnoff on the main road and didn’t allow her to enter Yuan Weijing’s village.

Later in the day, Glennie arranged to talk to Chen Guangcheng’s brother, Cheng Guangfu. He agreed to a brief interview.  Three carloads of unidentified people waited nearby. The correspondent was then followed as she left the province. On her return to Beijing, Glennie was told by a close family friend of the blind activist that, as a result of her interview, Chen Guangfu had been detained by police at around 9 p.m.  He was questioned and released later the same evening.  Glennie said: “I’d heard security had increased around the home of Chen Guangcheng’s wife in the lead-up to and during the Paralympics.”   The correspondent carried with her official journalist accreditation as well as her Paralympic accreditation and a copy of the Olympic reporting rules.

KASHGAR, XINJIANG PROVINCE: POLICE DETAIN JOURNALIST AND SOURCE, SEIZE LOCALS’ IDS

August 29, 2008 — Police detained and questioned for three hours James Miles of the Economist along with a local driver and a Uighur source, confiscated the identification documents of the two Uighur men and warned Miles not to report on what he had seen in Kashgar.

Miles was interviewing a source in a public area when the source received a phone call instructing him to report immediately to the local police station with the journalist and his driver. The three men went to the police station. They were separated for questioning, which was wide-ranging.  Miles characterized the interrogation as “tedious but polite”.  He said after all three men were released, the police kept the documents belonging to the Uighur driver and interview subject.  The driver is fine, but Miles was unable to contact the source in the days following.  “I was told not to report anything I had seen while I was traveling around Kashgar and that it would be troublesome for me if I did so,” said Miles.

BEIJING: OFFICERS ROUGH UP AP PHOTOGRAPHERS, SEIZE MEMORY CARDS

August 20, 2008: Two Associated Press photographers attempting to cover an Olympics-timed protest were roughed up by plainclothes security officers, forced into cars and taken to a nearby building where they were questioned before being released, the news service reported. Memory cards from their cameras were confiscated.

The two were separately trying to find a planned protest by free Tibet supporters late Wednesday southwest of the Bird’s Nest stadium. They arrived separately and each was set upon by people in civilian dress, apparently plainclothes state security agents or police. One was knocked to the ground, had his face pressed in the dirt, arm twisted behind his back and his cameras ripped from him. The other was tackled from behind, pushed to the ground, had his camera grabbed, all while being filmed.

They were forced into different unmarked cars, taken separately to an office a few blocks away, and held separately. Their photo cards were taken away. One was asked his views on Tibet. He was held for about 30-40 minutes before he was released. The other photographer was held for a similar length of time and then released.

MANCHENG, HEBEI PROVINCE: POLICE PREVENT UK TV CREW FROM FILMING FARMER
August 20, 2008: Officials interrupted filming of a corn farmer by a Sky TV crew that was working on a story about the drought in northern China. Holly Williams said the officials very aggressively told the woman farmer to halt what she was doing and then demanded to see the IDs of the film crew even though they were wearing Olympic IDs. The officials refused to show their own identification, but blocked filming by putting their hands over the camera and on the microphone. They then followed the film crew in a car all the way back to the Beijing city limits.
“It certainly had an impact on our story,” Williams said. “We needed the shot of corn farming, but we couldn’t do it.”

BEIJING: FINNISH REPORTER FOLLOWED, HARASSED
August 15, 2008: Katri Makkonen of Finnish Broadcasting Company and two others were followed by three men who prevented her from talking to locals in the Caochangdi district of Beijing about how they were enjoying the Olympics.
“Three goons followed us everywhere after we went to interview a lady in a shop watching a black-and-white TV they told her not to talk to us,” she said.
Police later arrived and questioned the reporters. Makkonen asked the police to tell the three men to stop following her and intimidating villagers.
“When I did that, the police just walked away. It was obvious that they were working together,” Makkonen. “It was really annoying because it made it impossible for us to speak to the people even though we were doing a nice story.”

FCCC PROTESTS ROUGHING UP OF JOURNALIST NEAR OLYMPIC STADIUM

Beijing, August 13, 2008: Police in Beijing roughed up and detained a British journalist after he covered a Free Tibet protest close to the city’s main Olympic zone. John Ray of Independent Television News said he was pinned down by police, dragged along the floor and pushed into a police van. The authorities also confiscated his equipment, pulled off his shoes, filmed him and accused him of trying to unfurl a Tibetan flag, he said. He denies the accusation, saying he was only trying to cover the protest. “The Foreign Correspondents’ Club of China is appalled by the detention and rough treatment of John Ray, an accredited journalist,less than a kilometer from the main Olympic stadium. We call on the authorities to return his equipment, apologise, and investigate potential illegal action or abuse of authority by police,” said Jonathan Watts, president of the FCCC.

BEIJING: POLICE BLOCK UK PHOTOGRAPHER, DAMAGE EQUIPMENT
August 13, 2008: Police damaged the camera of Guardian photographer Dan Chung as they tried to prevent him taking pictures of the aftermath of a pro-Tibet protest at the Ethnic Minorities Culture Park near the Olympic Green.
Police told Chung that neither his visible IOC accreditation nor the Olympic stickers on the equipment were of any of their concerns. A man in yellow-and-red clothing first blocked Chung’s lens while he tried to photograph the bicycles that the protesters had tried to use as a barricade. After police set up a cordon around the demonstration,
Chung followed instructions and stayed behind the line. Chinese in civilian clothes photographed all journalists covering the demonstration None of the photographers present were detained, but they were prevented from doing their work. He said the police broke the built-in flash on his Nikon camera as they jostled him.
“This was bad policing,” said Chung. “I mean, we stayed behind their line and still we were not allowed to do our work.”

BEIJING: AFP REPORTERS TURNED AWAY FROM HOME OF RIGHTS ACTIVIST
August 13, 2008: Two Agence France Presse reporters were turned away by security guards when they attempted to visit the home of Zeng Jinyan, the wife of imprisoned rights activist Hu Jia.
A print reporter and a television camerman tried to enter the compound at Bobo Freedom Village in Tongxian, east Beijing, but only got 10 meters inside the front gate.

SANHE TOWN, HEBEI PROVINCE: PLAINCLOTHES OFFICIALS INTIMIDATE SOURCES, BLOCK INTERVIEWS
August 12, 2008: Plainclothes officials intimidated sources while two Scandinavian journalists attempted to interview peach farmers in Hebei Province about how Olympics transport regulations are hurting their livelihood.
Beijing-based Sami Sillanpaa of Helsingin Sanomat and Philip Lote, a visiting colleague from Norwegian television NRK, were interviewing farmers when three carloads of people arrived and refused to identify themselves. Sillanpaa, who said the men were in constant telephone contact with someone to relay information about the journalists, said the officials just happened to show up and wanted to watch what was going on. “They ruined our interview,” said Sillanpaa. “After they arrived (the farmers) were not so willing to talk anymore.”
The pair then left the area and were followed by the unidentified officials who had disrupted their interview. The officials left off when the journalists crossed the provincial border en route to Beijing.

PINGFANG VILLAGE, BEIJING: POLICE DEMAND ID, FOLLOW REPORTERS
August 12, 2008: Two police officers in an unmarked car followed and briefly questioned two Scandinavian journalists working together on a story in an eastern suburb of Beijing. Police arrived in Pingfang village and demanded to see the identification of Beijing-based Sami Sillanpaa of Helsingen Sanomat and Philip Lote, a visiting correspondent from Norwegian television. The reporting pair was allowed to continue their work, but sources were reluctant to talk under the gaze of nearby police, Sillanpaa reported.

KUQA, XINJIANG PROVINCE: POLICE DETAIN VISITING U.K. PHOTOJOURNALIST
August 11, 2008: A visiting British photojournalist attempting to cover the aftermath of bombings in Xinjiang was detained for 7.5 hours by police, who said his travel documents were insufficient. Jack Hill, a British photographer with The Times, renewed his J-2 visiting journalist visa last week in Beijing and was assured by Public Security Bureau officials that, though they needed to keep his passport for processing, he could travel and work throughout China with the receipt they provided him. A three-person team from The Times arrived Sunday evening at a shopping area and bomb-blast site in central Kuqa when they were approached by local police demanding to see their identification. Richard Lloyd Parry, the writer traveling with Hill, was left alone when he produced his Olympics press accreditation. Hill, however, was told he needed to go the police station the next morning and pay a fine because the receipt for his passport and visa was not sufficient.
The next day, Hill arrived at the police station to pay the fine, but was kept there for 7.5 hours. Police denied his requests to be allowed to wait in his hotel for the problem to be resolved, and was told he’d be formally arrested if he left the police station. Hill was released only after Lloyd Parry asked a government official in a news conference why the photographer was being detained. The official’s staff telephoned the police, who then released Hill without requiring him to pay any fine or sign any statement.

XINJIANG PROVINCE: POLICE DETAIN JOURNALISTS, DELETE PHOTOS
August 8-10, 2008: An Associated Press writer and photographer were questioned by police, searched and detained at various locations over three days while covering the aftermath of bombings in Xinjiang province. AP journalist William Foreman and a photographer arrived in Yining, Xinjiang, near the Kazakhstan border, Friday evening and Foreman went to watch the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics on television outside with several workers from a local TV station. A manager arrived about 20 minutes into the ceremony and apparently called the police, who showed up a few minutes later and took Foreman to the police station. Photographer Ng Han Guan was picked up shortly after by a different group of police. Over the next 45 minutes, police did not allow Foreman to use his cell phone, videotaped the journalists and deleted images from the photographer’s camera, then released the pair.
On Saturday, the two journalists were preparing to board a plane to Urumqi when security officials at the check-in counter took them to a separate room and searched their bags, looked through images on their cameras and turned on Foreman’s laptop – apparently to look for photos. They were allowed to board their plane with few minutes to spare.
Mid-morning on Sunday, the AP team arrived in Kuqa, site of recent bombings, and were apprehended by police shortly after they began reporting in the town. Police told the pair the area was unsafe and they would have to go to the Kuqa Hotel, which Foreman said looked like a military command center. The journalists checked into the hotel and around 3 PM were allowed to leave and go about their reporting. Foreman reported no further problems in Kuqa after Monday.

PINGFANG DISTRICT, BEIJING: LOCAL OFFICIALS FOLLOW, VIDEOTAPE JOURNALISTS AND INTIMIDATE SOURCES
August 7, 2008: Local officials and plainclothes officers followed journalists attempting to report on migrant workers in Beijing, intimidating sources and later telling the journalists they needed government permission to conduct interviews.
Kristoffer Ronneberg, correspondent for the Norweigan newspaper Aftenposten, and Jes Randrup Nielsen of Jyllands-Posten (Denmark), were covering a story on migrant workers who were forced to leave Beijing because of a pre-Olympic clampdown. Five minutes after the media arrived at the village, a local official approached the reporters and asked for their identification; she recorded information from their documents. Three unmarked cars and various officials followed the journalists “and made
it impossible for us to talk to sources without putting them in danger,” recalled Ronneberg. The journalists confronted the officials following them; one said she had spoken to Propaganda authorities, who said they needed permission to speak with local people. “This is, of course, a clear violation of the new rules for foreign reporters,” said Ronneberg. The journalists, who decided to leave because of the obstruction, were also videotaped by the officials following them.

BEIJING: POLICE OBSTRUCT FILMING OF TIANANMEN SQUARE PROTEST
August 7, 2008: Plainclothes police and unidentified volunteers physically blocked foreign camera crews from filming and reporting on a demonstration and press conference by American Christians in Tiananmen Square. John Ray, China correspondent for Britain’s ITV, said as soon as reporters appeared at the protest by three Americans, plainclothes police — at least one flashing a badge — placed their bodies directly in front of cameras and journalists trying to record the event.
Ray said the ITV cameraman was physically pushed several times by police but not hurt; Ray did see another cameraman pushed to the ground during the commotion. While the plainclothes officers used their bodies, several middle-aged people then opened umbrellas to block camera views; officers in turn filmed the journalists at the scene.”They stood right in front of us and swore at us,” said Ray. It was “total, absolute obstruction; utterly blatant.”

KASHGAR, XINJIANG PROVINCE: TWO JAPANESE JOURNALISTS BEATEN UP BY PARAMILITARIES
August 4, 2008: Paramilitary police detained, kicked and beat two Japanese journalists attempting to cover the aftermath of deadly attacks on police in Xinjiang.
Paramilitaries forcibly removed from a public street then beat and detained Masami Kawakita, an Olympic-accredited photographer with the Chunichi Sports newspaper, and Shinji Katsuta, a reporter with the Nippon Television Network, according to their organizations, the Kyodo news service and several witnesses. The men also had equipment damaged.
Kawakita said he was surrounded by paramilitaries, lifted off the floor by his arms and legs and kicked. When he was put down again, one of the police put a boot on his face and pinned it to the floor. His flash was broken and he still feels pain in his elbow and ribs on his right side.
“It was unbelievable,” said Kawakita. “Imagine how I felt to be suddenly surrounded my paramilitaries.” In fifteen years in journalism, he said he had never experienced anything like it. Senior police officers apologised the following day.

KASHGAR, XINJIANG: POLICE DEMAND AFP PHOTOGRAPHER DELETE PHOTOS
August 4, 2008: Police insisted on seeing and deleting photographs taken by an Agence France Presse photographer who was covering the killing of paramilitary police in Kashgar.
The photographer, who was with two colleagues in a hotel room overlooking the site of the attack, was taking pictures from the window. When police saw this, they went with the hotel manager and a security guard to the room. They demanded to see the pictures and that they be
erased.

HANDAN, HEBEI PROVINCE: FINNISH REPORTER FOLLOWED, SOURCES HARASSED
August 1, 2008: Katri Makkonen of Finnish Broadcasting Company was followed and her sources harassed in Handan while trying to do a story on a steel factory.
The factory had refused requests for two weeks for a visit, but she wanted to talk to locals outside. Soon after she arrived, the head of the local propaganda bureau turned up in a big black car and ordered everyone to leave and not to talk to the reporter. One of the officials began filming villagers to intimidate them. When asked to explain, the official told Makkonen she didn’t want them to crowd her and asked her to come for tea and discuss the purpose of the reporting trip. When she reminded the official that this was not necessary under Olympic reporting regulations, the official eventually relented.
But from then on, Makkonen was followed.
“We interviewed someone and then three people barged into his house,” said Makkonen. “It was the people from the factory who we had been calling for two weeks and refused to let us interview them.”
BEIJING: POLICE SHOVE DANISH CREW AT TICKET BUYING AREA, BREAK CAMERA
July 25, 2008: Beijing police manhandled a Danish television journalist and his Chinese assistant, knocking their camera to the ground and breaking it as the team tried to cover the crowds lined up to buy tickets during the last round of Olympic ticket sales.
DR Asia Bureau Chief Jan Larsen said the crew’s camera and monopod were broken; they could not resume filming after police shoved them away from the media zone around the ticket-buying area. Larsen said the interference took place as crowds began to get angry over chaos in the queues, and was one of several reported incidents of police tussling with media who were trying to cover the ticket sales.
“It was the usual conduct of the police in situations where things get out of control,” said Larsen, who observed that authorities were trying to stop TV media from filming the situation “rather than finding solutions to the chaos that was emerging.”
BEIJING: POLICE SHOVE JOURNALISTS, DAMAGE EQUIPMENT ACCORDING TO MEDIA REPORTS
July 22, 2008:  According to multiple press reports and video clips
posted online, at least four Hong Kong journalists were manhandled, shoved and pushed by police while attempting to cover a crowd of Beijingers trying to buy Olympics tickets. Video clips show police shoving photographers and other media away as a rush of ticket-buyers tried to push ahead in the line. At least two cameramen were grabbed by the neck and shoved, while another was pulled down from the ladder on which he was standing to shoot photos. A South China Morning Post photographer was detained, and later apologized for kicking one of the policemen in the groin. Hong Kong media reported some injuries and damage to equipment as a result of police action. The SCMP quoted Zhao Dongming, head of the Cultural Ctivities Department of the Beijing Games organizing committee as saying,  ”We deeply regret what happened…Perhaps there was some mishandling at the site of the incident. I think after this experience everyone will find a way to do a better job.”

DALIAN: STATE SECURITY WARNS LOCALS NOT TO TALK TO BBC
July 19, 2008: State security told potential interviewees in Dalian not to talk to Rupert Wingfield Hayes of the BBC when he attempted to ask them about their involvement in a Carrefour boycott.

TAISHI, GUANGDONG PROVINVE: BBC CREW STOPPED AND THEN FOLLOWED
July 15, 2008: Rupert Wingfield Hayes of the BBC was followed and prevented from talking freely to villagers in Taishi, where locals fear reprisals for speaking with foreign journalists.
He said local officials stopped him as soon as he arrived and kept him waiting for about an hour as they took down his team’s details and videoed them. When he insisted on moving on, he counted 11 people following him.
“Whenever we stopped to talk to people, at least eight of them surrounded us and said something in Cantonese to those we tried to speak to so no-one would talk.”
After he left, a car followed him all the way back to Guangzhou. A local source told the BBC that one man was held incommunicado this summer for 26 days after speaking to a foreign journalist.

BEIJING: POLICE INTERRUPT UK REPORTERS AT PETITIONERS VILLAGE
July 12, 2008: Police interrupted a reporting visit by Rupert Wingfield Hayes of the BBC to the former petitioners village near South Beijing railway station in July. While talking to locals for about half an hour, he could see an informant in a black shirt calling on a mobile phone. Police then came and took down all their details and then left.
While they were talking, however, he saw 30 security guards had been sent around the area to scare off the remaining petitioners and tell them not to talk to him.

BEIJING: POLICE STOP AND TRY TO INTIMIDATE JOURNALIST
July, 2008:  Holly Williams of Sky TV was stopped by police when she and her crew attempted to film in the petitioners village near South Beijing Railway station. The police arrived within minutes and demanded that she hand over the petition papers that locals had given
her. When she refused, the police took her ID into their car and then drove a short distance up the road as Williams gave chase. “They were clearly trying to intimidate us,” she said. After the petitioners got on their knees, the police eventually left, leaving Sky with dramatic
images to broadcast. “To be honest, the police really helped our story. It added drama to our story about whether China had lived up to its Olympic promises.”
DUJIANGYAN, SICHUAN PROVINCE: AUTHORITIES DENY IRISH TIMES JOURNALIST ACCESS, FORCE PHOTOGRAPHER TO DELETE IMAGES
June 23-24, 2008: Plainclothes police turned Irish Times journalist Clifford Coonan and a photographer away from the home of parents whose children died in the May 12 earthquake. Later authorities further harassed Coonan, intimidated his Chinese sources in a bid to prevent them from giving interviews, and compelled the photographer to erase photos.
The day after being denied access to the parents’ home, Coonan returned to Dujiangyan at the parent’s urging to accompany them as they filed a petition at the local courthouse. Government officials in Chengdu had given Coonan reporting passes, but local police in Dujiangyan were still blocking access  and widely intimidating sources. “We were told to leave by a polite court official,” said Coonan. “Then as we were leaving, two extremely gruff uniformed police approached the car and made the photographer wipe his  memory card.”
Coonan said a high fence and police in riot gear surrounded the Juyuan Middle School, which collapsed and killed hundreds of students and was made famous by a visit from Premier Wen Jiabao in the early days of the disaster. For nearly two weeks after the quake, it remained open to the public and press and was the site of many impromptu memorials by grieving parents.

GREAT WALL AT SIMATAI, BEIJING: POLICE DISRUPT PREVIOUSLY APPROVED LIVE TV BROADCAST
JULY 3, 2008: Plainclothes and uniformed security officials blocked a live broadcast by German ZDF television from the Great Wall, saying the American analyst they were interviewing was “not a licensed Chinese expert.”
ZDF’s Johannes Hano said his crew and sources experienced repeated “massive interference” during a week of live broadcasts all of which had prior government approvals about beautiful spots in Beijing. During the Great Wall interview, guards jumped in front of their live camera and stopped the broadcast. The ZDF crew called theForeign Ministry and International Press Center and was allowed to continue, said Hano, “but we had to always take into consideration that they would stop us again.” Several sources interviewed throughout the week were harassed by police, he recalled, and some who previously had agreed to be interviewed ultimately refused. ZDF plans to file “a sharp protest” with the Chinese government, said Hano. ” While the abort of our live [broadcast] was a massive interference it is only the tip of the iceberg  of what we experienced during the whole week of our long-planned live broadcasts from China.”

HEBEI PROVINCE – POLICE HARRASS, DETAIN JOURNALISTS REPORTING ON WATER DIVERSION
JUNE 26, 2008: Police and local officials who refused to identify hemselves followed for nine hours, harassed and briefly detained three foreign journalists, their Chinese assistant and a source traveling with them in Hebei Province. The media were trying to report on water diversion to Beijing.
The journalists – one each from the U.S., the Netherlands, and Spain – first noticed local officials at a diversion canal project near Changgucheng village, where a woman asked what they were doing and if they had come to see the mayor. After leaving the canal, the reporters saw two unmarked cars which followed them for 90 minutes to a reservoir, where they were denied access. The journalists then attempted to access a second reservoir the Wangkui but were stopped by 15 people who blocked the road with a table, saying the road has been closed for four years. After two hours of negotiation and showing their press cards to the only uniformed officer present (who was the only person who showed an I.D. to the media) the journalists were allowed to leave. Despite being promised they wouldn’t be followed, the media were followed to the entrance of the expressway to Beijing.
The journalists had phoned the Foreign Ministry and International Press Center in Beijing for assistance when local officers said they wouldn’t allow the party to leave the blockaded area. The IPC said it could not help. Foreign Ministry officials did not call back as promised, though one responded several days later.

XIANGER, SICHUAN PROVINCE: WSJ REPORTER ORDERED TO LEAVE THREE TOWNS WITH COLLAPSED SCHOOLS
June 18, 2008 – The Wall Street Journal reported that, during the
second week in June, police barred one of its correspondents from
entering neighborhoods around four collapsed schools and ordered him to leave three such towns, including Xianger. The WSJ said one of its reporters was sought out by Wang Guoqing of the State Council Information office, who said he was troubled to hear foreign media were being denied access and had flown to Sichuan to resolve the situation.

XIAOYI, SHANXI PROVINCE: OFFICIALS BLOCK JOURNALISTS’ ACCESS TO COAL MINE AND SOURCES
JUNE 15-17, 2008: Local officials and police followed for three days and harassed a reporter and photographer from the Danish newspaper Berlingske Tidende, preventing them from interviewing miners and local residents about a coal mine disaster in Shanxi province.
Ten uniformed officers blocked the journalists from getting near the mine outside of Xiaoyi. The officers, who refused to show identity cards, would not answer questions about the presence of police and emergency vehicles at the mine. When the journalists attempted to interview truck drivers and other local residents, officials approached them and said a propaganda official would come to meet them. That meeting was followed by two more days of negotiations and dinners with officials who promised to show them a coal mine and allow them to interview miners.
Eventually, the correspondents gained access to an empty mine scheduled to open in 2009. Officials then drove the team to a road blocked by a giant mud puddle, telling them it was the county’s only road to a coal mine. (The county has 184 mines).  ”Had they said `No, we don’t want to show you a coal mine,’ we would have gone elsewhere on our own. Instead, they constantly delayed [us] and we never saw anything,” recalled the journalist. “They were not threatening, they were just professionally obstructing our work.”

DUJIANGYUAN: TV CREW BLOCKED, SOURCES TAKEN AWAY FOR COMPULSORY ‘SIGHTSEEING’
June 12, 2008 — Police prevented a Japanese TV crew from entering an area where a school had collapsed in the Sichuan earthquake. The family they had arranged to talk to were ordered to go on a “sightseeing trip” with officials. “They didn’t want to go because they wanted to be at the school for [the quake's] one month anniversary. But they had no choice,” said the reporter. “We were forced to do a report in the road where we were stopped because we couldn’t get into the area.”
JUYUAN, SICHUAN PROVINCE: POLICE BLOCK U.S. REPORTER’S ACCESS TO COLLAPSED SCHOOL
June 11, 2008 – Police stopped an American newspaper journalist
from visiting the site of the Juyuan Middle School in Juyuan Town, Sichuan. Although the correspondent had a valid press pass to report on the earthquake, issued by the Sichuan provincial government, he was told he could not enter the town unless he registered with authorities in Dujiangyan City.
In Dujiangyan, the head of the foreign affairs office, Dong Guonei, said by telephone there was no need for foreign journalists to register and the reporter should be able to visit the school, where one teaching building collapsed in the earthquake. But she added that the police in Juyuan would not listen to her. Arriving back in Juyuan, the journalist walked towards the school but was stopped by a police officer at a roadblock. The officer said that no journalists, Chinese or foreign, could enter. The policeman apologized and said he was only following orders. He refused to give his name; his badge number was 004175.

DUJIANGYUAN: JAPANESE REPORTERS BLOCKED, DETAINED, FORCED TO PAY FINE

June 10, 2008 — Police detained a Japanese TV reporter and cameraman after they attempted to report on parents who had lost children in schools that collapsed during the Sichuan earthquake. When the crew tried to film parents crying in front of the school, police put their hands over the camera lens, then detained both the journalists and the parents. They escorted the journalists from the area, fined one of them 200 yuan for leaving her passport in a hotel room and forced them to write self-criticisms marked with a finger print. “It took six hours. Even though the policewoman was kind, it was impossible to do my job,” said the reporter.

JIANDI, SICHUAN PROVINCE: POLICE HARASS U.K. JOURNALISTS, DENY THEM ACCESS TO SOURCES
JUNE 9-10, 2008 – Police stopped a three-person TV4 (U.K.) television team, headed by Lindsey Hilsum,  from filming and interviewing parents at a middle school in Jiandi township, Shifang, where 56 children died in the earthquake. Several police followed the journalists from Deyang to Jiandi, monitoring and videotaping them throughout the town as they spoke with parents. Authorities halted the media’s reporting efforts at several points and repeatedly told them to move on for “safety reasons.” At one location the reporters said a policeman “pulled villagers away, apparently to tell them not to talk to us. One man later asked us if we had been sent by Falun Gong,” the banned spiritual group. The following day, the crew was stopped from entering Jiandi at a roadblock where a posted sign dated June 1 warned: “No vehicles other than aid vehicles are allowed. No entering or gathering of people who have no business. No interviews, photographs or video tape by media or other staff without permission. If you do not follow the rules you may be severely punished.”

DUJIANGYAN, SICHUAN PROVINCE: POLICE DETAIN FILM CREW, ORDER JOURNALISTS TO WRITE SELF-CRITICISM
JUNE 5, 2008 – Police barred filming, then detained a three-person crew from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation for three hours after the journalists attempted to report from outside the barricaded grounds of the Juyuan middle school, where many students died in the May 12 earthquake.
A journalist, cameraman and local producer were attempting to film outside the school when police who were blocking access to the school told them to stop filming and asked for their passports. The group was not carrying their passports and had been unable to get new press credentials issued by Sichuan provincial authorities for the earthquake zone. They were told to wait for a superior officer at the scene, and when they attempted to leave the school after about an hour, were taken to the local police station for questioning.
ABC journalist Stephen McDonell said the police rejected their assertions about the new Olympics reporting rules, telling the journalists that those were “legislative rules” from Beijing, but that the Communist Party offices in Chengdu had to issue separate press cards for earthquake areas. The Chengdu office, McDonell said, told ABC that June press cards were not yet available. The team was also warned not to try to enter so-called “traffic control” areas, which, they were told, apply not only to cars but also to unsanctioned parties traveling by foot or other means. After writing a self-criticism and promising to follow the rules, the team was released.

DUJIANGYAN, SICHUAN PROVINCE: JOURNALISTS HASSLED BY POLICE,  ISSUED EXPIRED PRESS CREDENTIALS
JUNE 4-6, 2008 – Journalist Ole Torp and a cameraman for Norwegian Broadcasting were chased away from the Juyuan Middle School and a primary school, first by plainclothes officers then, a day later, by armed police who seemed to be “in full battle gear,” said Torp.
Earlier, the local foreign affairs office had issued expired press credentials to the journalists, saying that it’d run out of current press passes and that credentials  which had expired several days earlier were still valid.
In contrast to the police who chased the team away from two Dujiangyan schools: in one case while the journalists were interviewing a dead student’s bereaved grandfather — Torp said several younger local police officers were “almost demonstratively
sympathetic” to the journalists for telling the world about the post-earthquake situation. Those officers allowed filming, but asked the crew to hurry.

DUJIANGYAN, SICHUAN PROVINCE: POLICE BAR JOURNALISTS FROM ENTERING QUAKE PROTEST CITY, THREATEN DRIVER
JUNE 4, 2008: Police prevented two Dutch correspondents from entering Dujiangyan on June 4, and later barred them from a collapsed middle school where parents had been congregating since the earthquake.  The reporters for Elsevier and Radio Netherlands were turned back at a police checkpoint leading into Dujiangyan. Police told the reporters they couldn’t enter the city because “the situation was very fierce.” Police then told the journalists’ driver if he persisted in trying to enter Dujiangyan they would record his license number and car details and it would “cause problems” for him. The journalists proceeded to enter the city via a back road, but were unable to visit the grounds of the Juyuan middle school due to a police barricade.  An official from the local Foreign Affairs Office approached the journalists and told them reports of foreign journalists being detained a day earlier were “just false rumors,” and said the authorities knew nothing of attempts by parents to petition at the courthouse.

DUJIANGYAN, SICHUAN PROVINCE: POLICE MANHANDLE, DETAIN REPORTERS COVERING LAWSUIT BY PARENTS OF QUAKE VICTIMS
JUNE 3, 2008– Police detained a reporter and photographer from Kyodo News as they were covering a story on parents who were trying to file a lawsuit over the deaths of students at a collapsed school.  About ten policemen surrounded the photographer, grabbed him by his arms, and took him into a courthouse. The parents gathered in front of the building protested, and asked the officers why they were detaining a foreign journalist.  Several minutes later authorities pulled the reporter away from the crowd and took him into the courthouse. A local government official told journalists they were not under arrest, but were being taken inside the courthouse for their own safety.  The two were allowed to leave about an hour later. Chinese authorities prevented the more than 150 parents from filing a lawsuit over the deaths of students at a school that collapsed in the May 12 earthquake, allegedly due to shoddy construction.

DUJIANGYAN, SICHUAN PROVINCE: POLICE GRAB, DETAIN REPORTERS, WARN THEM NOT TO COVER PROTESTS BY QUAKE VICTIM PARENTS
JUNE 3, 2008– Police detained a reporter and photographer from Associated Press and told them not to cover protests by parents who lost children in the May 12 earthquake. Reporter Cara Anna and photographer Ng Han Guan arrived around 9:30 a.m. at the courthouse in Dujiangyan, where parents were protesting shoddy school construction. Police grabbed their arms and pulled them up the stairs of the courthouse. They were taken to the lobby to wait for officials from the local government’s Foreign Affairs Office. The official arrived and lectured the journalists not to cover such protests. The official said people were bound to have different opinions following the quake but the reporters should pay no attention to such things. The journalists were released about half an hour later.

DUJIANGYAN, SICHUAN PROVINCE: POLICE “MANHANDLE” REPORTER, ASSISTANT AWAY FROM GOVERNMENT MEETING WITH PARENTS

JUNE 2, 2008 – Police forcibly removed a Christian Science Monitor correspondent and his Chinese assistant from covering a meeting between local officials and angry bereaved parents of children who died in the Juyuan middle school.  Several riot police, one regular police officer and a man in  plain clothes pushed and shoved correspondent Peter Ford and his assistant out of the meeting as it was getting started, telling them it was a “special moment” and they had to leave for their own safety. The reporting team snuck back in 20 minutes later.  After another 20 minutes, police spotted Ford and told him, “This area is under police control, you must leave immediately.” He and his assistant left the gathering.XIAHE, GANSU

PROVINCE: POLICE FOLLOW, BLOCK DUTCH JOURNALIST FROM REPORTING
Early June, 2008 – Police in Gansu tailed Dutch journalist Hans
Moleman of Volkskrant newspaper and a Tibetan-speaking interpreter, insisting on the first day that he check out of his hotel in Xiahe because foreigners were not allowed to stay there. On the second day, police followed Moleman to his hotel in Hezuo, came to his room and informed him that the entire area was off-limits to foreign journalists. On the third day, police followed the team from Hezuo 250 kilometers to Lanzhou, where local police then took up the tailing detail.
The men following the journalists also checked into the same hotel, and proceeded to follow them throughout the next day, including to the airport when the journalists left town.”I was able to get the story, though,” Moleman reported. “(I) had expected this sort of attention and had taken some precautions.”

SICHUAN PROVINCE: MILITARY DELETE PHOTOS, CONFISCATE VIDEO
MAY 15, 2008– Jonathan Watts of Britain’s Guardian newspaper said military personnel working in Niufei Village, Pingwu County,told his reporting team they were not allowed to video the soldiers en route to a school buried in a landslide. “I told them they should be proud of what they are doing, and they should let the people know,” Watts said. “But they confiscated a video tape, deleted some photographs, and told us to leave.” In Mianyang the next day, Watts was obstructed by police from entering a refugee camp, although he said domestic journalists appeared to have unfettered access. Two days later, he was held up at a checkpoint near Zipingpu dam by a soldier who claimed he was under orders to prevent foreigners from entering “because spies had infiltrated the area.” On other occasions Watts said he received unprecedented cooperation from security personnel, including rides in trucks and on speedboats. “It was a mixture. In a single day you could experience refreshing openness and a feeling of shared humanity. Then, straight after, the same old frustrating restrictions and suspicion of foreigners that was normal in the past,” he said. “Overall, my encounters with police and troops were more positive than at any time before. But it seemed to depend on the individual rather than be the result of any change of policy.”

SICHUAN PROVINCE: CORRESPONDENTS HELD AT ROADBLOCK
MAY 14, 2008– Sami Sillanpaa, correspondent for the Finnish daily Helsingin Sanomat, said two days after the May 12 earthquake in Sichuan a half dozen foreign correspondents were barred at a roadblock from entering the town of Beichuan near the epicenter. While the foreign journalists were held up, Chinese journalists got on a minibus and were allowed through. Sillanpaa said in the early days after the quake he was stopped at about five roadblocks outside Dujiangyan, Mianyang and elsewhere. Twice policemen told him foreign correspondents need to get permission from the local government’s foreign affairs office to pass through. On another occasion authorities interfered with his interviews in a hospital in Deyang town, saying he could spread viruses. Nearby, a Chinese journalist filmed unimpeded.

SICHUAN PROVINCE: TV REPORTER ROUGHED UP AND DETAINED
MAY 14, 2008– Four policemen pushed around and detained for 90 minutes a Finnish TV reporter who was on her way to Beichuan near the epicenter of the Sichuan earthquake. Katri Makkonen of the Finnish broadcasting company YLE said police harassed her after local Foreign Affairs officers told her they had an order not to allow foreign correspondents to enter the hard-hit city. “My cameraman managed to get in. While I was being detained, he was helping people buried in the rubble, without many rescuers in sight,” Makkonen said. She was later allowed to enter the city. Despite the detention, Makkonen was generally “very very surprised by the good way we were treated. At one roadblock I told the military I was a journalist, and he said ‘welcome’ and let us in.”

SICHUAN PROVINCE: POLICE CONFISCATE PRESS CARDS, TRY TO FORCIBLY CONFISCATE TAPES OF QUAKE DISASTER
May 13, 2008– Police confiscated press cards from a TV team in Juyuan and tried to forcibly seize video the team took of the earthquake disaster area. At 3:00 a.m., 12 hours after the earthquake struck, a police officer who refused to identify himself confiscated reporters’ press cards issued by the Chinese government. “They surrounded us and started pulling us — at our clothes, our hands and arms, at my bag, at our camera — we felt physically threatened and did not feel safe,” said a reporter. The team alerted the Foreign Ministry, and the Foreign Ministry was able to locate the teams press cards and return them within a few days.

NINGXIA AUTONOMOUS REGION: DOCUMENTARY PRODUCER BARRED FROM FILMING DESPITE HAVING PRIOR PERMISSION
April 24, 2008 – The foreign affairs office in Ningxia blocked a documentary producer from researching locations for a project on climate change, even though the producer had earlier obtained permission to film in the area.  The documentary crew was met in Yinchuan, Ningxia on arrival at the airport and ordered to return to Beijing, by authorities “who said we were no longer allowed to film in Ningxia,” according to a member of the team.

GANZI, SICHUAN PROVINCE: REPORTER, PHOTOGRAPHER KEPT UNDER POLICE ESCORT IN TIBETAN AREA
APR. 12-13: Police stopped a reporter and photographer from Kyodo News at a checkpoint as they tried to enter the Tibetan-inhabited city of Ganzi in western Sichuan Province. Three policemen insisted they escort the reporter and photographer for their own safety, and followed them everywhere they went — at times in a separate car, at times on foot — while they were in Ganzi. The reporting team also was denied access to a Tibetan temple and was told the reason was because no journalist could enter without a press pass for the Beijing Olympics — even though such passes have yet to be issued.

SICHUAN PROVINCE: TV CREW TURNED BACK ON WAY TO TIBETAN AREA
MAR. 19, 2008– Police at a roadblock five hours’ drive southwest of Chengdu ordered a Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s television crew to return to Chengdu and “not venture out of the city.”  The three-member TV crew was trying to reach Tibetan areas.  ”The police officers who manned the roadblock on the only road leading to the area were polite but firm. They said no foreigner was allowed into the area because of concerns for their safety,” said CBC Bureau Chief Michel Cormier.

SICHUAN PROVINCE: POLICE STOP TV CREW FROM TRAVELLING TO TIBETAN AREA IN ABA
MAR. 18. 2008– Police stopped a three-person CNN TV crew led by reporter Jon Vause at a police checkpoint about 300 kilometres from Aba, their intended destination and the origin of reports alleging multiple Tibetan shooting victims. Police told the journalists to step out of the car, took their photos, and wrote down details from their passports. The police acted firmly but politely, and asked the crew to turn around.

TONGREN, QINGHAI PROVINCE AND XIAHE, GANSU PROVINCE: REPORTER MADE TO LEAVE TIBETAN AREAS
MAR. 17, 2008– Five policemen entered a hotel room where a
Kyodo News reporter was staying at around 1:30 a.m. and demanded to see his identification papers. Local foreign affairs officials later told the reporter to leave the area because it was “dangerous.” Later that same day near Xiahe, Gansu Province, police stopped the same reporter when he tried to reach an area where demonstrations were taking place. He was told to leave; police vehicles escorted his car until he left the province.

XIAHE, GANSU PROVINCE: POLICE DETAIN TV CREW, THREATEN TO CONFISCATE TV FOOTAGE
MAR. 17, 2008– Police detained a Finnish Broadcasting Co.
correspondent and cameraman outside the monastery town of Xiahe and threatened to confiscate their footage. The team arrived in Xiahe on March 15, and was trying to leave when law enforcement officers brought them to the police station. The police insisted they had a right to view the correspondents’ footage because the reporters had been in a forbidden area during a police operation. The police said they would confiscate any sensitive material. “We declined to show the footage and said that Prime Minister Wen Jiabao has said that foreign journalists have the right to report freely. They said ‘You don’t want to know what will happen if you don’t show us the footage,” said correspondent Katri Makkonen. The journalists showed the police one tape. After 90 minutes, the reporters left with the tape they showed to the police as well as the ones they managed to hide.

LINXIA, GANSU PROVINCE: POLICE TURN AWAY REPORTER DUE TO “POLICE ACTION”
Mar. 17, 2008– Police turned back a reporter from Britain’s The Guardian after he drove over a mountain pass to enter an area where protests had taken place near the border between Sichuan and Gansu. Reporter Jonathan Watts said an English-speaking officer told him “There is a police action taking place. Foreigners are not allowed
inside. These are the orders of high authority.” He said a Foreign Ministry official told a colleague: “When there is some emergency, the local authority has the power to set up prohibited areas for outsiders. This is for the stability and unity of that province and this country.”

LANZHOU, GANSU PROVINCE: POLICE BLOCK CREW EN ROUTE TO XIAHE, THREATEN DRIVER WITH ARREST
MAR. 16, 2008– Police stopped Belgian Public Broadcaster’s (VRT)
correspondent, cameraman, assistant and Chinese driver at a roadblock on the way from Lanzhou to Xiahe. Police told the reporting team to show their ID’s and press cards and questioned them. The journalists were told they couldn’t travel further because there was a police operation going on, and they were being stopped for their own security. When the correspondent showed the police and local foreign affairs officer the new foreign media reporting rules, he was told that the regulations weren’t valid due to the police operation.
The police threatened the driver with arrest if he continued with
the crew. Correspondent Tom van de Weghe asked the police what
would happen if he were to continue by foot. “We will arrest you and put you on an airplane,” replied the police. The crew left the road block after about two hours, drove five hours and spent the night in Xining, Qinghai Province.
During the night the police called the  Chinese driver many times
to ask to which locations he had driven the team. The crew experienced problems sending the reports to Belgium because of restricted internet access.

XIAHE, GANSU PROVINCE: TV TEAM TURNED AWAY DUE TO “TROUBLE AHEAD”
MAR. 16, 2008– Police stopped correspondents from
Britain’s ITV News at a toll both an hour
outside of the monastery town Xiahe, took details from
their passports, and told them to leave. A plainclothes
policeman filmed the reporters. Authorities also recorded
the driver’s license and license plate of the Lanzhou taxi
driver, who “was terrified,” said ITV correspondent John
Ray. ” The only explanation we were given was there was
‘trouble ahead’. When we pressed them, we were told the
road was damaged.” On their way back to Lanzhou the
journalists were pulled over at another toll booth and
once again asked for their passports. “No explanation was
offered; nor could they reconcile the road block with the
Olympic regulations concerning foreign journalists,” said
Ray. “We tried to film them, but were shooed away.”
After returning to Beijing, the ITV journalists were
manhandled off a university campus where Tibetan students
were holding a candlelit vigil, and people they believe to
be plainclothes police photographed them.

CHENGDU, SICHUAN PROVINCE: POLICE BAR FILMING IN TIBETAN NEIGHBORHOOD
MAR. 16, 2008– Police barred a television crew from ABC
News of the U.S. from filming in a Tibetan neighborhood.
When the reporters informed police of the Olympic rule
allowing foreign reporters to travel and interview anyone
who consents, Stephanie Sy says police “simply shrugged
and hailed us a taxi.”

XIAHE, GANSU PROVINCE: POLICE TURN AWAY, TAIL REPORTER
MAR. 16, 2008– Police turned back a correspondent for
U.S. National Public Radio who was seeking to reach Xiahe.
The correspondent was first stopped at a checkpoint about
50 kilometers outside of Lanzhou. The reporter took a back
road, and was turned back again at a checkpoint 20
kilometers outside of Xiahe. Louisa Lim’s car was followed
by a police car for about 100 kilometers. Then a black
sedan tailed her for about 300 kilometers, until she had
almost reached the airport.

XIAHE, GANSU PROVINCE: U.S. DOCUMENTARY CREW KEPT UNDER SURVEILLANCE, BARRED FROM FILMING
MAR. 13-15, 2008 – Authorities barred a U.S. film crew from using e-mail or leaving its hotel, and abruptly terminated its plans to continue filming at Labrang Monastery.  Authorities also ordered the eight-member crew not to talk about the police in riot gear and soldiers it saw headed toward Labrang monastery, one day before news broke of riots in Lhasa on March 14.  The crew had been at the monastery for two days filming a documentary on Tibetan culture for a six-part series titled “Change in China.” On the afternoon of March 13, sound man Spence Palermo says he passed a half dozen local police in riot gear headed towards the monastery. “On their heels were two separate columns of about two dozen Chinese soldiers each, also decked out in shielded helmets and night sticks. ”  At dinner authorities informed crew members they would not be allowed to film the monastery the following day as planned.  Instead, they filmed a monastery of the “Ben sect” about 40 miles outside of Xiahe. On the night of March 14, they were individually escorted to their rooms and told they wouldn’t be allowed to leave their rooms until the next morning. The next morning, Palermo heard a commotion outside the hotel and saw a convoy of Chinese military trucks: “I figured over 400 soldiers were headed to the monastery.  Suddenly there was a pounding on the door and a very irate and panicky official started grabbing my gear and hustling me down to the lobby, saying that we had to leave ‘immediately.’ We were led out of town.” After the crew filmed at an ancient fort, its members were told they would not be allowed to return to Xiahe.  Instead, their Chinese assistant went to the hotel to pick up their equipment and luggage.  ”Apparently the protests had spread through the whole town and our hotel – state-run of course — had been targeted [and] all of the windows smashed out,” Palermo recalls, “[There were] fires burning on the street. The word was that under no circumstances would Western media be allowed anywhere near the town.”

SHENYANG: POLICE SEIZE VIDEOTAPES, FOREIGN MINISTRY THREATENS DEPORTATION OVER N. KOREAN REFUGEE REPORTING
MAR. 5, 2008– A cameraman for Czech TV says undercover police
searched his room, seized four videotapes and went through his computer after he conducted interviews with North Korean refugees.
Officials at the Chinese Foreign Ministry accused the journalist of funding and planning the storming of “foreign offices” in Beijing, charges he denies. Police questioned the reporter for approximately two-and-a-half hours in a Holiday Inn hotel restaurant and in his room. The police searched the reporter’s computer and two mobile phones, despite his objections. They searched his room, opening all the drawers, going through his personal belongings and checking his bed.
The journalist unsuccessfully tried to reach someone at the Chinese
Foreign Ministry. An official at the Czech Embassy asked to speak to the undercover agent, but the agent hung up. The agents did not allow the journalist to make any more phone calls or answer his phone.
The police opened the safe in his room, removed four videotapes and confiscated them, and searched through an external hard drive they found in the safe.
During the search the journalist defended himself, saying that as a foreign journalist he has the right to talk with consenting interviewees under the Olympic free reporting rules. He was told that he could only interview people related to Olympics. The agents did not present a search warrant, and did not give the journalist a receipt for the videos they seized.
The following day the reporter lodged a complaint with the Chinese
Foreign Ministry in Beijing and requested the return of the tapes.
Later, the Foreign Ministry summoned the reporter and claimed
to have evidence he was planning and financing the storming
of foreign offices in Beijing. “I was told if I had broken a law I would be deported. I would only be allowed to remain in the country if a situation like Shenyang were never repeated.’”
The journalist has received reports (http://www.hrwf.net/) that
the four refugees he was supposed to interview were detained by
Chinese authorities shortly before his hotel room was searched.

WUZHONG, NINGXIA PROVINCE: POLICE REQUIRE REPORTERS TO REGISTER, DESPITE OLYMPICS REPORTING RULES
FEB.25, 2008 – Officials in Ningxia demanded that two correspondents – one French, one Danish – register with authorities before interviewing an imam, after the journalists were told by foreign affairs offices in Shanghai and Ningxia that due to new Olympics reporting rules, the offices could not issue reporting permits.
Plainclothes officers met the journalists at their pre-appointed interview at a mosque, first claiming to be relatives of the Imam whom the media had contacted. The officers obstructed the interview, only later revealing their true identities. After 30 minutes, one of the journalists asked an officer to call the Ningxia foreign affairs office to clarify if the reporters had the right to be in the area. The journalists were asked to register with police.
When the media arrived at the police station, they found officers reading the Olympics reporting rules. The journalists were required to register; the police refused to provide their identification.  After the media returned to meet the imam, police called him five times during the hour-long interview, demanding to know what questions the reporters were asking. “We have been told we can go freely anywhere, but it’s not true,” said Caroline Dijkhuis of the French newspaper 20 minutes

SHANDONG PROVINCE: THUGS INTERFERE WITH GERMAN TV CREW, THROW STONES
JAN. 24, 2008: Six to seven plainclothes thugs prevented a four-person ARD TV team from approaching the home of Yuan Weijing in a Shandong province village. It was the second attempt in two weeks by Germany’s ARD to talk with Yuan, wife of imprisoned blind human-rights activist Chen Guangcheng. During the first attempt,  police had arrested Yuan’s brother shortly before the team arrived. In the more recent incident, two of the thugs had stones in their hands and threatened the journalists. During the brawl that ensued, the cameraman fell to the ground. One of the thugs hit the camera with a stone, but didn`t destroy it. The team was not beaten but the journalists were threatened, insists ARD correspondent Jochen Gräbert. Although nobody was injured, he says, “these guys were like fighting robots. It was a dangerous situation.” After the team retreated to the outskirts of the village, Yuan came out of her house but was prevented from speaking to the media.

BEIJING: DETAINED TV CREW ORDERED TO SHOW FOOTAGE, SIGN CONFESSION
January 14, 2008: Police detained four Scandinavian television correspondents for two hours after denying them an interview with blogger Zeng Jinyan about the detention of her husband, HIV/AIDS activist Hu Jia, in late December. The reporters represented three Scandinavian TV stations. Police blocked the reporters from entering Zeng’s apartment building, then detained them because one of the team members, Jan Larsen of Denmark’s DR TV, was not carrying his passport. The police and the property owner demanded to see the journalists’ video recording to make sure the crew had not filmed inside the compound. The police threatened to confiscate the camera, and initially refused to return Larsen’s press card until he rolled his tape. After Larsen phoned the Danish Embassy, police told him to write a confession for not carrying his passport, but dropped the demand that he show his footage. Another correspondent showed the property owner and authorities his footage to demonstrate he had not filmed inside the complex. After departing the police station, the journalists were able to talk with Zeng, who was in her fourth-floor apartment, by shouting to her from outside of the compound. At the time of the incident, authorities were holding Hu Jia at an unknown detention center on suspicion of “incitement to subvert state power.”

SHANGHAI: JOURNALISTS HELD FOR ONE HOUR COVERING ANTI-MAGLEV PROTEST
JAN. 12, 2008: Shanghai Police held Ola Wong of the Swedish daily Sydsvenska Dagbladet and a Canadian freelance photographer for one hour while they were covering protestors in Shanghai’s People’s Square who oppose plans for a magnetic-levitation train project. Hundreds of Shanghai residents turned out to demonstrate against a plan to extend the existing maglev train line to the city center over concerns that it would emit electromagnetic radiation and pose a health hazard.   Wong said police took the journalists away from the reporting scene to a nearby police station, allegedly for doing ‘illegal reporting.’  “Their pretext was that I didn’t bring my passport with me. We were released after one hour. The photographer got a shove in the back from one police officer but other than that they behaved ok.
BEIJING: JAPANESE JOURNALISTS DETAINED, FORCED TO WRITE SELF-CRITICISM
January 2008 — People’s Liberation Army soldiers held a crew from a Japanese TV channel for three hours after they filmed buildings near a barracks in Beijing. Although the crew was in a public area, soldiers took them away for questioning, split them up, and forced them to write a self-criticism before they were allowed to go. “We had to mark it with a finger print. They treated us like criminals,” the reporter said.
DONGZHOU, GUANGDONG PROVINCE: LOCAL OFFICIALS ASSERT THEY CAN BAR REPORTERS ON SECURITY CONCERNS
DEC. 26, 2007– Plainclothes personnel riding in a marked police vehicle detained AP correspondent Bill Foreman, and authorities escorted him out of the village of Dongzhou in southern Guangdong province. He went there to confirm reports of renewed protests in the village where two years ago three men were shot and killed in demonstrations against government land acquisition. At the time, residents said the government gave them inadequate compensation for land taken to build an electric power plant. In December 2007, Radio Free Asia reported that about 1,000 riot police fired tear gas at protesters in Dongzhou. Residents were reluctant to speak about the protests to a foreign correspondent.  Foreman said while he was walking down a narrow side street lined with shops, four plainclothes officers in a marked police car grabbed him by the arm and put him in the car without saying what he had done wrong. At the police station, after 30 minutes, a vice director of the propaganda department of the local communist party committee showed up. He wanted to see Foreman’s passport and press card. He also wanted to know to whom he had talked and what they said. (Foreman said he couldn’t understand anyone because they spoke in dialect). Foreman brought up the new media guidelines, and the official said the law allows local governments to declare that certain places are off limits because of security concerns. Another official said reporters would probably be allowed to return to Dongzhou by February. After an hour, the authorities drove him to the closest big city, Shanwei, about a half hour away and checked him into a hotel.

HEBEI: REPORTER BEATEN, TAPE DESTROYED IN LAND DISPUTE VILLAGE
NOV. 20, 2007:Swiss TV correspondent Barbara Luthi and her cameraman and local assistant were roughed up and detained for seven hours in Shengyou Village, Dingzhou County, Hebei Province. One of their tapes was erased by the authorities. The Swiss TV team had been interviewing villagers at the site of a land dispute that in 2005 resulted in a pitched battle that claimed six lives. “I have been interrogated by police before, but this was on a whole different scale,” said Luthi. “It is the first time I have been physically beaten.” She said six cars drove up containing ten to12 men, who claimed to be local villagers. She believes they were plainclothes police. Two of the cars did not have number plates. She says the men were “quite brutal.” They twisted her arm, and grabbed a camera and bags. In the struggle, Luthi fell to the ground. The issue was eventually resolved when the plainclothes men called the local foreign affairs bureau.

WUHAN: PHOTOGRAPHERS DETAINED FOR THREE HOURS
NOV. 20, 2007– Mathias Braschler and Monika Fischer, Swiss photographers were detained for three hours in Wuchang, the southern area of Wuhan. Uniformed police detained the phogographers shortly after residents started describing how they had been beaten up and threatened in a dispute over property. It was the third time the couple have been detained during their travels around China. They said it was the most unpleasant experience.
“They were much rougher in the way they treated us,” said Braschler. ”After two hours, we said we are just going to leave. Then the chief  of police came. He was very unfriendly and threatened to detain us for 12 hours if we didn’t go back to the police station. He seriously threatened us. The (police) said we couldn’t go until they checked us.” Eventually someone from the police foreign affairs department arrived, and invited the photographers to lunch to clarify the situation. “We said no.Then they got tough again. They said they wanted to check all our film, carmeras and notebook. I said two options – either we are free so we can go. Or we are arrested so we call the Swiss Embassy. Eventually they let us go,” said Braschler.

ANHUI: SOURCE, REPORTERS DETAINED AFTER INTERVIEW WITH YOUNG FARM GIRL
NOV. 9, 2007– An Al-Jazeera television team was detained in a village in Anhui province, about an hour outside of Hefei. Melissa Chan says the team had been interviewing a young farm girl for a “very benign story on the life of a little girl.” She says local officials stopped the team and “insisted we ‘lunch’ with them.” The reporters said they had to get a plane back to Beijing. The officials persisted, and brought the Al-Jazeera team in for “a cup of tea.” Chan reports: “Tea dragged on for an hour, and then we discovered they had dragged the farmer we had spoken to, to the police station. The situation escalated, with us insisting they let him go before we leave. We then told them we’d go to the police station ourselves, at which point officials locked the gates so we could not leave the premises.” The team was detained for about three hours, with no explanation. When the correspondents showed the officials a copy of the reporting regulations, the officials said they were aware of the new rules. Chan says the Al-Jazeera team ended up calling the Foreign Ministry in Beijing for help and, “to their credit”, officials there made the relevant calls to get the team released.

BEIJING: POLICE OBSTRUCT PHOTOGRAPHER, INSIST ON SEEING TEMPORARY RESIDENCE REGISTRATION DOCUMENT
OCT. 17, 2007– Authorities blocked AP photographer Greg Baker from photographing Beijing Christian activist Hua Huiqi because he was not carrying his temporary residence registration form. Baker was seeking to enter a courtyard home to photograph Hua Huiqi, who had been beaten. When Baker argued he had all the legally required documentation with him, and that he could not have gotten his visa without having first registered his residence with police, he was told he “had to prove” he had registered.

BEIJING: BUREAUCRATIC HARASSMENT IN HOSPITAL EMERGENCY WARD
OCT. 12, 2007– Immigration police pulled two reporters away from the emergency ward at Tiantan hospital where they were reporting on the beating of Christian activist Hua Huiqi. At the time, Hua Huiqi was unconscious; it seemed he was being denied treatment. The police were polite, but spent half an hour examining passports and press cards, and lecturing the reporters on a rule about carrying their police residence registration. “They knew they couldn’t stop us from doing what we were doing. It seemed designed to take the journalist away from the story,” said South China Morning Post reporter Didi Kirsten Tatlow.

BEIJING: POLICE TRACK JOURNALISTS FROM FENGTAI TO TIANANMEN, BAR FILMING IN PUBLIC AREAS
OCT. 11, 2007– Finnish Broadcasting Co. correspondent Katri Makkonen and a colleague were blocked by authorities from filming petitioners in Fengtai, and then barred from filming in Tiananmen Square. Authorities originally said the reporters were allowed to film the Fengtai petitioner area as long as they avoided the hutong next to the courthouse. But other police continued to block their camera. After the journalists left, police phoned their taxi driver to find out where they were headed next. When they arrived in Tiananmen Square the journalists were approached by police who said they’d been instructed to look for the “Finnish journalists”. The journalists were told they are not allowed to film in Tiananmen Square, and were warned they could be threatened or harmed in the square. At both locations authorities repeatedly asked for their passports and press cards, and spent about 15 minutes taking down details. “It was obvious that the police knew that they couldn’t detain us but still tried in every way to stop us from working. It was pretty amazing that they tracked down the cab driver and then even alerted the police on Tiananmen,” said Makkonen. The previous day her cameraman had been turned away from Fengtai because he was allegedly blocking traffic.

URUMUQI: PHOTOGRAPHERS DETAINED
OCT. 4, 2007– Swiss photographers Monika Fischer and Mathias Braschler were detained for five hours after photographing a uniformed man they saw walking along a railway track. The man gave his permission to be photographed. The police said the photographers were not supposed to be on the tracks. The police checked their cameras and asked to see all of their receipts for hotels, food and road tolls since entering Xinjiang. They released the photographers with a warning to “be careful” around Uighur people.

BEIJING: TWO JOURNALISTS DETAINED FOR FILMING MATCHMAKERS IN PARK
SEPT. 30, 2007– Feature Story News Reporter Sam Beattie and AFP’s Francois Bougon spent ten hours with police after interviewing and filming matchmakers in Beijing’s Zhongshan Park. The journalists called the police after four people, including an older woman, grabbed them and demanded they delete footage of the people in the crowd who had not given permission to be filmed. (The four claimed to represent the people in the park.) The reporters showed the woman and other complainants that their images were not recorded. The police tried to find a compromise, and suggested the reporters delete the tape. The reporters declined. At 2:00 a.m., after intervention by a senior police officer and a Foreign Ministry official, the reporters were allowed to depart with the tape.

SHENZHEN: LABOR RIGHTS ACTIVIST DETAINED IN MIDST OF INTERVIEW IN GUANGDONG PROVINCE
SEPT. 29, 2007– Police detained a labor rights activist Zhang Zhiru during an interview with Finnish reporter Sami Sillanpaa of Helsingin Sanomat. Two police officers entered the office and demanded Zhang accompany them to the police station. They refused to say why. The police detained Zhang for several hours, during which they asked him the identity of the reporter, what story the reporter was working on, and how the reporter knew about the Labour Dispute Service Center, which helps migrant workers involved in legal disputes with factories. Zhang was warned not to tell the foreigner “unnecessary things.” Zhang was able to meet Sillanpaa later that day. Zhang said police also intervened in March when he and some other labour rights defenders were interviewed by an Australian journalist

BEIJING: INTERFERENCE IN TIANANMEN SQUARE
SEPT. 28, 2007– Marije Vlaskamp of RTL Dutch Television News was told by police the rule that allows filming in Tiananmen Square without prior permission was ‘changed until further notice.’ She was allowed to do her standup under the Mao portrait after she started to phone the State Council Information Office to get an explanation of the new rules. A plainclothes officer harassed her staff with personal questions about their address, their salary, and employment history.

BEIJING: TV TEAM ROUGHED UP, CAMERA DAMAGED BY THUGS
SEPT. 14, 2007– A reporting team from Britain’s Channel 4 was assaulted by thugs, and then detained by police following interviews with petitioner “inmates” at an illegal detention center in the outskirts of Beijing. The center is operated out of the Nanyang City government of Henan’s Beijing liason office. The thugs damaged the journalists’ camera and tried to destroy their footage. The reporters called the police, who stopped the violence but did not follow through when the reporters tried to press charges of assault. The police told the reporters they couldn’t leave until they signed a confession admitting they’d illegally entered a government office. The reporters said they were not aware they had been filming in a government office. The journalists said a woman at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said she could not assist their release. The two visiting reporters, Andrew Carter and Aidan Hartley, were detained for six hours. They were released after destroying a tape. Their Chinese fixer, Dean Peng was detained for 10 hours. Police issued an official warning to Peng accusing him of disturbing “administrative order” in the government liason office. Peng is seeking to cancel the warning on the grounds that the journalists’ reporting  was conducted legally. He has appealed the case to the Fengtai district court

HEBEI: TWO JOURNALISTS DETAINED REPORTING ON FORCED EVICTION OF FARMERS
SEPT. 12, 2007– Reporter Robert Saiget and photographer Goh Chai Hin of Agence France-Presse were detained for nearly five hours in Shengyou Village, Dingzhou County, Hebei Province, where they were confirming reports of an August 28th clash between police and villagers. The violence followed the reported recent death of a local farmer from injuries suffered in June 2005, when hundreds of armed thugs killed six and injured 51 farmers while seeking to evict them from their land to make way for a power plant. Local police accused the AFP journalists of illegal reporting and demanded the names of their contacts in the village. The journalists were released after they showed the local Foreign Affairs officials a copy of the new Olympic reporting rules.

BEIJING: REPORTER TACKLED AND KICKED BY THUGS AT ILLICIT DETENTION CENTER
SEPT. 10, 2007– Reuters correspondent Chris Buckley was tackled to the ground, kicked in the back, and punched by more than a dozen thugs while investigating a claim about an illicit detention center in Beijing for petitioners coming to the capital to air grievances. Buckley was attacked while leaving the center, located at the Beijing liason office of Nanyang City, Henan Province. The thugs took his bag with notes, a mobile phone and camera. They pinned him to a chair. One man added to the tension by threatening to kill the reporter. Buckley’s attackers then called the police. He was only allowed to make phone calls after a senior officer arrived. Once Buckley could phone the Foreign Ministry, its staff were prompt and helpful. After that call, the senior police officer returned Buckley’s possessions and recorded his official complaint. He has heard of no police follow-up to prosecute his assailants.

ONE SOURCE BEATEN, TWO INTIMIDATED IN SEPARATE INCIDENTS
SEPT.– A European broadcaster reported three incidents of intimidation of sources. One source was beaten;two were threatened. The broadcaster said none of the sources were discussing “very sensitive” issues.

BEIJING: JAPANESE TV CREW DETAINED, CHINESE SOURCES HELD FOR 10 DAYS
September 2007 — Police held a reporter from a Japanese broadcaster for two hours after the reporter tried to film an elderly couple in Tiananmen Square ahead of the 17th party congress in Beijing. The couple wanted to petition the government regarding compensation for the imminent demolition of their home next to the new CCTV tower. “They got detained. So did we,” said the reporter. “The [petitioners] were in their 80s but they were detained for 10 days.” The journalist was held for two hours and freed after she showed there was nothing sensitive on the tapes in the camera. While the elderly couple were in detention, their home was destroyed.
XINJIANG: REPORTER INTERROGATED, SEARCHED, SOURCES INTIMIDATED
AUG. 2007— During a reporting trip to Xinjiang, the Muslim Uighur region in China’s far west, reporter Brice Pedroletti of France’s Le Monde newspaper was followed and searched, and his sources were intimidated. Pedroletti visited the apartment of the daughter of exiled human rights advocate Rebiya Kadeer. The family told him it was not “convenient” to talk. Two days later three plainclothes officers took Pedroletti to a backroom at his hotel and interrgated him for 45 minutes before he rushed off to catch a flight. He was frequently followed during his seven-day trip to Kashgar and surrounding counties, where he was investigating claims of abuses of teenage Uighur girls sent to work in factories in eastern China. One source told Pedroletti he was questioned for two hours the day after speaking to the foreign reporter in his shop. Pedroletti said a family he visited was questioned after he left by men in a car that was shadowing him. Before crossing the Kirghizstan border police searched Pedroletti’s bag and examined his photographs. “The constant surveillance prevented me from hiring a good interpreter and freely reporting,” said Pedroletti. “Sources were scared to talk to me, and I did not want to put them in danger.”

TIBET: INTERVIEWS INTERRUPTED, JOURNALISTS ORDERED TO WRITE SELF-CENSORSHIP PLEDGE
AUG. 2007– A European documentary team– which the government had granted permission to report in Tibet– was repeatedly harassed by local authorities during its visit there. Authorities interrupted two interviews, once because the Tibetan language  was used, and once because authorities appeared concerned the interviewee would say something critical about life in Tibet. In some locations, authorities withdrew previously granted permission to film due to “safety” concerns. Authorities also asked the team to erase footage, which the team refused to do. When the team reached the border with Nepal, an accompanying foreign affairs official from Bejing said if the team did not sign a pledge about how it would use its footage, it would have to return to Lhasa to submit its film to censorship authorities. The team felt it had no choice but to sign a document saying its reporting material would “never be used to deliberately uglify Tibet and China… (or)… be used to depict any prostitution, environmental, sanitation, and public dissatisfaction problems.”

BEIJING: SEVEN JOURNALISTS HELD ONE HOUR AFTER INTERVIEW WITH WIFE OF BLIND ACTIVIST CHEN GUANGCHENG
Aug. 24, 2007– Seven journalists from three media outlets, including Hong Kong’s Cable TV, were held for one hour after interviewing Yuan Weijing, the wife of blind activist Chen Guangcheng. The reporters were stopped by about seven police officers as they left the home of activist Hu Jia, where the interview had taken place. The police recorded their passport and press card details before allowing them to depart. The delay prevented the reporters from accompanying Yuan to the airport. The police said they were responding to a complaint by Hu Jia’s neighbor that a number of foreigners were conducting interviews in the compound.

JIANGSU: REPORTERS HARASSED OUTSIDE COURTHOUSE IN YIXING
AUG. 10, 2007– Reporters from the South China Morning Post and the New York Times were turned away from Yixing court where they planned to cover the trial of environmental activist Wu Lihong. Outside the courthouse, three people believed to be plainclothes police officers photographed and verbally harassed the reporters. One of the three searched one of the journalists’ bags when the journalist stepped away, in apparent violation of Constitutional protection of privacy.

BEIJING: POLICE DETAIN A DOZEN FOREIGN CORRESPONDENTS FOLLOWING NEWS CONFERENCE ON MEDIA FREEDOM IN CHINA ONE YEAR AHEAD OF THE OLYMPICS
AUG. 6, 2007– Police prevented around a dozen foreign reporters from leaving the site of a news conference on media freedom in China and a subsequent event staged by Reporters Without Borders (RSF). Some reporters were detained for about 90 minutes. One reporter was shoved around. One call to the Foreign Ministry went unanswered. Another call was answered, but the police officer refused to speak to ministry officials. Police asked reporters why they attended, who informed them of the event, and what was the purpose of handcuffs in a poster used by the organizers.

HEBEI: JAPANESE TV CREW DETAINED, FORCED TO DESTROY TAPES
July 2007 — Police detained a reporter and cameraman for a Japanese broadcaster as they attempted to cover a story about drought in Hebei province. The news crew was forced to halt filming of farmers in a corn field, then taken away to a restaurant where they were interrogated and forced to destroy their tapes. After more than three hours, the journalists were allowed to leave, but officials followed them to the provincial boundary.
TIBET: GERMAN JOURNALIST HARASSED, REPRIMANDED FOR TRIP
APRIL, 2007– Harald Maass, correspondent for the German daily Frankfurter Rundschau, was harassed after arriving in Lhasa in April to do a story on Mount Everest climbers – along with an accompanying colleague, a photographer and the local people whom they had contacted. Maass was prevented by police from going to the city of Shigatse to do his story, while interview subjects in Lhasa, as well as a travel agency he had hired a car from, were heavily fined and warned not to talk to him. Maass was summoned by the Foreign Ministry on May 15 and strongly criticized for his trip. A ministry official told Maass to “correct his mistakes.”

BEIJING: CANADIAN REPORTER REPRIMANDED FOR COVERAGE OF JAILED CANADIAN CITIZEN
APRIL 30, 2007– Geoffrey York, correspondent for Canada’s Globe and Mail, was called into the Foreign Ministry to be reprimanded over his coverage of the case of Huseyin Celil, a Canadian citizen and ethnic Uyghur who was recently found guilty of “splittism” and membership in terrorist organizations by a Xinjiang court. The ministry official expressed dissatisfaction that York and his coverage had raised questions about the case and about the fairness of the Chinese legal system. The official also expressed displeasure with a 63-word article about the plight of Tibetans, Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities.

SHANGHAI: JAPANESE NEWSPAPER REPORTER ATTACKED AT CONSTRUCTION SITE OF 2010 WORLD EXPO
MARCH 27, 2007– Mayumi Otani, correspondent for Japan’s Mainichi Newspaper, was assaulted in Shanghai on March 27 while covering a demonstration in a neighborhood that was being demolished for the 2010 World Expo. Three men hit her while she was photographing a protestor who was being forced into a government car. Otani stumbled and fell into the bushes. When she protested to a government official who was at the site, he replied that the local workers were ill-mannered. A demonstrator told her the three men had been hired by the government or the construction company to ensure that the project went smoothly.

BEIJING: AMERICAN PHOTOJOURNALIST JOSTLED AND REPEATEDLY STOPPED FROM PHOTOGRAPHING, INTERVIEWING
Elizabeth Dalziel, photographer for the Associated Press, has on several occasions been stopped by plain clothes police, security guards and regular police when trying to interview or take photographs of activists and other sources. In one case, she was detained by police officers shortly after arriving at the “petitioners village” in Beijing. She was later told she could shoot photos as long as she was not on the grounds of the petitions office. However, she was later blocked, pushed and shoved by plain clothes police who arrived there shortly afterwards.

N. KOREA BORDER: BRITISH TV CREW DETAINED TWICE
JAN., 2007– Holly Williams and her crew from Britain’s Sky News were detained twice in two days in January near the North Korean border, where they were doing a story about signs of North Korean poverty which were evident in China. On the first occasion secret police detained the crew then handed them over to local police, who said they themselves “still hadn’t grasped” the new regulations. After a couple hours the journalists were released, following a call to the foreign ministry. The following day, a military officer grabbed their camera while they were filming and gave it back only after the crew agreed to go with him to a nearby military base. They were held there for several hours and eventually released after a second call to the foreign ministry that day. Sky News employees also have been compelled to stop reporting in Tiananmen Square and reprimanded officially regarding a story on the state of China’s zoos.
2006 Reporting Interference Incidents
2005 and earlier

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