NYT/Reuters: Press Groups Criticize China Curbs on Foreign News

[DeepModem Mom]

Press Groups Criticize China Curbs on Foreign News
By REUTERS
Published: September 11, 2006

BEIJING (Reuters) - International press groups denounced new Chinese curbs on the dissemination of foreign news as a step backwards ahead of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, when thousands of journalists will descend on the country's capital.

The official Xinhua news agency announced rules on Sunday requiring foreign media to seek its approval with immediate effect to distribute news, pictures and graphics within China.

Warning against news that endangers national security, sabotages national unification or promotes cults, the rules empower Xinhua to censor reports distributed in China by foreign media and to delete forbidden content.

"These new regulations on the distribution of foreign news are a step backward,'' Joel Simon, executive director of the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists, said in a statement received on Tuesday.

"It is greatly distressing that less than two years before the start of the Olympic Games in Beijing, the government is attempting to tighten its financial and political control over the flow of information in China.''...

http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/world/international-media-china.html

[ConcernedCanuk]

1. Gee - wonder why anyone would worry about reporting from the US M$M?

.
.
.

We ALL know how honest and "fair and balanced" the US Main Stream Media reporting is . . .

Shame on ya China!