Reporters Without Borders (RSF) marked World Press Freedom Day on Wednesday last week with the latest edition of its World Press Freedom Index, which ranks countries on the degree of freedom their journalists and news organizations enjoy. This year, China slipped to its lowest ranking since the survey began in 2002 — just ahead of last-place North Korea. Keeping company with notoriously repressive Pyongyang serves as a stark reminder of how far press freedom has fallen under Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) in the world’s second-most populous country.
According to RSF, China leads the world in terms of detained or imprisoned journalists at 114. Some of them are Taiwanese, and their numbers appear to be growing. Last month, China confirmed that Gusa Press editor-in-chief Li Yanhe (李延賀), better known by his pen name, Fucha (富察), was under investigation for suspected endangerment of national security, revealing what happened after he mysteriously went missing while visiting family in Shanghai.
Commenting on Li’s detention, democracy advocate Lee Ming-che (李明哲) stressed that China used to secretly exert pressure, “but now it just flagrantly arrests people.”
Just as flagrant is the alleged detention of EBC News (東森新聞) reporters who were in Pingtan in China’s Fujian Province last month to cover Chinese People’s Liberation Army drills, whose cameras even caught a soldier asking for their credentials to “make sure you’re not spies.” EBC has insisted the reporters are safe and have maintained contact, but sources said they are under “restricted residence” in Xiamen and might face charges.
The case most emblematic of China’s press crackdown is the ongoing persecution of Hong Kong tycoon Jimmy Lai (黎智英), whose Apple Daily newspaper in 2021 became a casualty of Beijing’s ploy to scrub all pro-democracy voices from Hong Kong following the passage of the contentious National Security Law.
The International Federation of Journalists and the US Congressional-Executive Commission on China took the occasion of World Press Freedom Day to call for the release of Li, Lai and other jailed journalists, drawing further attention to the worsening plight of reporters working in China.
Beijing would do well to heed the call, if not for the lofty ideal of press freedom, then for its own sake.
With global distrust of China at an all-time high, Beijing is clearly losing the optics game. All the world sees about China is increasingly bellicose rhetoric from diplomats and officials, compounding the image of a hostile monolith that is driving the engine of distrust. Without independent journalists to report on what is actually happening in China to humanize the nation’s plight and foster global understanding, the chasm between China and the rest of the world will only continue to widen.
Expelling journalists from China has also played a significant role in the surge of global interest in Taiwan. Journalists who have relocated to Taipei are now covering the nation with more nuance and viewing cross-strait issues from Taiwan’s perspective, likely doing more than anything else to counter Beijing’s “one China” claims. China only has itself to blame for this sea change in sympathies.
At the same time, Taiwan cannot sit on its laurels when it comes to defending its hard-won press freedom. Although the nation climbed three spots in this year’s list, RSF warned that it was only due to changes in other nations’ rankings. Taiwan is still facing a “very polarized environment dominated by sensationalism and pursuit of profit,” making it difficult to pursue quality reporting. Add to that the challenge of incessant Chinese interference in the form of surreptitious funding and false reporting, as well as an important upcoming election, and robust unbiased reporting becomes more important than ever.
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