Media colleagues jump to senior journalist Shen Hao’s defence after televised confession

Commentators and members of the press have expressed sympathy for the former boss of one of China’s leading financial news outlets after he confessed to his involvement in an alleged news extortion scheme.

Shen Hao, the former director-general of the group that runs the 21st Century Business Herald, has been detained along with 30 others from the firm, including their chief editors and advertising executives, and two executives from a Shanghai and a Shenzhen public relations firm.

Citing Shanghai police, Xinhua said the three media outlets allegedly shared a similar approach to soliciting illicit gains, and were closely linked.

Despite Shen’s confession, in which he said that he regretted betraying his profession, a number of commentators took to popular microblogging site Weibo to argue that misconduct was hard to avoid in an industry where such malpractice was prevalent.

Wang Xuming, head of Language and Literature Press, said “media organisations that do not separate their editorial from their commercial operations are very common [in China]. And these have become a hotbed of crime”.

This was echoed by Wu Fei, a media professor from Zhejiang University. “Most media bosses would not be able to escape punishment under the standards showed in this case,” Wu said, referring to Shen’s situation.