Mick Hartley

This little tale casts an interesting light on how things work in China. Journalist Nick Young ran a nonprofit newsletter, China Development Brief, which was subscribed to by a specialist readership of international aid agencies and China-watchers:

In 2002, we added a Chinese-language edition, owned and run by a small team of Chinese writers who covered similar ground from their perspective for a readership of some 5,000 Chinese nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), researchers, and government staff.

Neither newsletter complied with China’s highly restrictive publishing laws, which entail political controls that prevent the kind of objective and independent reporting that we offered. But we seemed to have found a lacuna of tolerance that, I believed, might presage the gradual advance of free expression.

Our work in Chinese was sometimes cited and even reprinted (without permission) by state-authorized media. I appeared as a guest expert on Chinese TV programs covering such topics as poverty reduction and public health. On several occasions, central-government officials sought my opinion on issues such as the development of a legal framework for China’s nonprofit sector.

Then, perhaps prompted by e-mails he’d exchanged with a Xinjiang exile group, things got nasty:

The tolerance evaporated this summer. In the past two years, prompted by concerns about “color revolutions” elsewhere, security agents had been keeping a close watch on China’s civil society. It seems that a sweep of potential troublemakers was deemed overdue.

On July 4, our office was visited by a dozen officials, police, and security agents, who ordered us to stop publishing. They came wielding video cameras, which they directed at us while rifling through papers and questioning us. Ominously, one of the group boasted to my colleagues that his team was “fluent in foreign languages, including Arabic and Uighur” – the language of the Muslim majority in Xinjiang, China’s northwest frontier province.

I was made to sign a statement admitting to “conducting unauthorized surveys” in contravention of laws that give the Chinese state a monopoly on information gathering. Colleagues on our Chinese edition were charged with distributing an unlicensed publication and subsequently fined 12,000 yuan (about $1,500).

There followed an offer he couldn’t refuse, from an apparently high-ranking Chinese security official in charge of watching terrorism and NGOs. Either become a propagandist for China, or leave the country.

Song said he could provide funds to expand our publishing and make it “famous” while helping the world to understand China better. In return, I would have to report directly to him. But, he warned, I should never tell anyone of this conversation, not even my wife. And if I rejected the deal I would be permanently barred. Pledging obedience to a threatening stranger was not an attractive idea, but I asked for time to think about it.

Two days later I met with Song again, having consulted colleagues and agreed with them on a negotiating position. We were prepared to try copublishing with a relevant government agency, accepting some loss of editorial independence; but would insist that the lines of accountability and control be transparent. We could accept Chinese cofunding only on a joint-venture basis with international backers, as is typically the case in aid projects.

But I had no opportunity to suggest terms. The second interview, at which a high-ranking uniformed police officer was also present, was short and frigid. I was told emphatically that I had to obey local laws or my presence would not be tolerated. Song did not mention his previous offer and dismissed all efforts to broach the subject. A few days later I left the country, planning to return in September.

On his return his visa was cancelled and he was packed off back to Europe.

(Via Japundit)