Policing the internet

October 24th, 2012

The more we live our lives online, the greater the temptation for governments and private companies to spy on us. Padraig Reidy highlights the dark side of our increasing dependence on digital communications
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China will change leaders, but keep censorship

September 12th, 2012

As the Communist Party Congress approaches, Dinah Gardner looks at the prospects for free speech in the People’s Republic

The mechanics of China’s internet censorship

August 9th, 2012

China: Hong Kong journalists complain about editor’s self-censorship

June 22nd, 2012

A prominent Hong Kong newspaper has been criticised for self censorship by members of its staff. Journalists at the South China Morning Post have complained over coverage of the suspicious death of  dissident Li Wangyang on 6 June. A number of emails between senior subeditor Alex Price to the newspaper’s editor Wang Xiangwei described staff concerns, as Price said that the minimal coverage of the death looked “a lot like self censorship”. Wang responded: “I don’t have to explain to you anything. I made the decision and I stand by it. If you don’t like it, you know what to do.”

Sport v human rights

June 18th, 2012

Despite talk of reform, the Bahrain Grand Prix and the Beijing Olympics proved to be catalysts for rights abuses. Mihir Bose asks whether human rights should be a criterion for hosting coveted international sporting events

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China: Dissident found dead

June 7th, 2012

Chinese dissident Li Wangyang, who was jailed for over 22 years after the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests, was found dead in a hospital ward in Shaoyang city, Hunan province, on Wednesday. Family members found the dissident, 62, apparently hanged by a bandage around his neck in his hospital room. Security and hospital authorities have said he had committed suicide but his family has said Li died in strange circumstances. Police are also reported to have removed his body without the family’s permission.

China: Editor dismissed for online comments

June 6th, 2012

The editor of a Chinese newspaper has been dismissed after posting comments online deemed critical of the government. Yu Chen, editor of the investigative news desk at Southern Metropolitan Newspaper, was initially suspended and later forced to resign after he accidentally used the newspapers Sina Weibo account to respond  a question on whether China’s Ministry of National Defence should serve the Chinese Communist Party. Yu’s post was deleted immediately, along with the message he was responding to. Yu is the first journalist in China to be forced to resign from a newspaper as a result of online comments.

China: Censors erase 13 minutes from ‘Men in Black 3′ to remove Chinese villains

May 31st, 2012

China’s film censors have erased 13 minutes of footage from the new Men in Black film to remove the appearance of Chinese villains. Beijing’s censors have removed a scene showing an alien disguised as a Chinese restaurant worker, along with the appearance of a Chinese cashier girl who uses her long alien tongue to attack Will Smith’s character, Agent J. The final cut taken from the film involved Smith erasing the memories of a group of Chinese onlookers. One of the country’s newspapers speculated that the last scene had been removed as a statement on “internet censorship to maintain social stability”.