Freedom of the press meets the police state
Most everyone, no doubt, has read stories about Chinese authorities intimidating journalists, restricting Internet access at Olympic media centers, and other various reports of violations of Beijing’s supposed promise to allow freedom for the international press during the Games. You’ve probably seen headlines recently like “Chinese police beat, detain 2 Japanese reporters,” for example.
If, as they say, a picture is worth a thousand words, then a video is worth a million.
Foreign Correspondent John Ray of Britain’s ITN was covering a small pro-Tibet protest near the Bird’s Nest in Beijing today when he was “bundled away, pushed to the floor and pinned down” before being “manhandled into the back of a police van.” After “arresting” Mr. Ray and questioning him about his views on Tibet while he was driven around in the back of the van, the police let him go. His equipment has not been returned.
From the Guardian, another video of the same incident, showing Chinese police shoving and roughing up other journalists and cameramen covering the protest.
Did anyone really expect the Chinese to keep their promise of allowing free press access? I sure didn’t.
I’m not surprised that overall turnout for the games is small. The venues should be packed and there should be tens of thousands in the Olympic green each night. The government has now resorted to scouring the countryside for people to fill the empty seats. They claim to have sold out of tickets but if that were so, where are the fans those tickets went to and why do they think they can fill the same seats with “cheer squads”?
The communist regime and corrupt members of the International Olympic Committee will never admit it, but I think they grossly underestimated the revulsion most people felt when Beijing was selected to host the games. They will likely blame the high cost of international travel and make other excuses for the low turnout this year. It should be really interesting to compare the turnout of these games with the next ones in London.
I’m sure that Bush and McCain cheered the Chinese police when they took away cameras and suppressed the press, kinda like the bad news from Iraq, eh?
http://dangerousintersection.org/2008/08/04/15-reasons-john-mccain-is-too-ignorant-to-be-president/
Hogan,
Exactly how much rope do you burn up each day? Must everything be about the devils, Bush and Cheney? Are you some sort of productive citizen in our society or do you sponge off the govt waiting for your next handout?
Keep shopping at Communist China Mart so you can keep their economy growing. This way they will burn more oil and their military will get stronger. I don’t know why more of the dummies didn’t go over there.