US Secretary of State calls China the biggest violator of press freedoms, citing detention data
- Antony Blinken condemns Beijing for detaining journalists and using technology to ‘increase surveillance, harassment, censorship’ both at home and abroad
- Comments, which also assail China’s use of propaganda and disinformation, come during observance of World Press Freedom Day
Washington’s top diplomat used the occasion of World Press Freedom Day to knock the mainland Chinese and Hong Kong governments for media restrictions and alleged harassment of journalists and dissidents worldwide.
Citing data compiled by the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), a New York-based non-profit advocacy group, Secretary of State Antony Blinken called China the biggest threat to press freedom in terms of the number of journalists under detention because of their work.
“We’ve been deeply concerned about what we’re seeing from the PRC in terms of its misuse of its technology to try to do things like increase surveillance, harassment, intimidation, censorship of PRC citizens, of journalists, of activists and others, and that includes abroad,” he said, using the acronym for People’s Republic of China.
Chinese government officials, Blinken said, “are using the free and open media – that we ensure that are protected in democratic systems – to spread propaganda, to spread disinformation.
“It also appears that they are further using these systems to stalk, harass, to threaten critics who are outside the PRC’s territory,” he added.
World Press Freedom Day was proclaimed by the United Nations General Assembly in 1993 following a recommendation by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (Unesco), of which China is a member. Hong Kong has separate representation at Unesco.
China’s embassy in Washington rejected Blinken’s criticism as “an attempt to pressure China with unfounded allegations”, which “exposes the US side’s hegemony, bullying and double standard on media and press freedom”.