Journalists have left China due to excessive intimidation or state expulsions, according to the report.
Threats of legal action, online troll campaigns and shrinking numbers after colleagues are kicked out: Foreign journalists in China face “unprecedented hurdles” due to efforts to discredit independent reporting, a media group said on Monday .
Beijing appears to be “encouraging a series of lawsuits,” or the threat of legal action, against foreign journalists, often filed long after sources agreed to interviews, the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of China (FCCC) said in its annual report. .
“In particular, news organizations face warnings that their reporting may expose them to legal sanctions or civil lawsuits or, more disturbingly, national security investigations,” it added.
The increased threat of legal action comes after the 2020 arrest of Australian TV host Cheng Lei, who worked for Chinese state broadcaster CGTN, and Haze Fan of Bloomberg News.
Meanwhile, foreign journalists and their organizations have developed emergency exit plans in the face of heightened risks, and “state-backed attacks…particularly online trolling campaigns” have made it difficult for those that remain to operate, according to the FCCC report.
The findings were based on a survey of 127 of its 192 members.
In 2020, China announced that it would expel American journalists from three major American newspapers: The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Wall Street Journal.
Many of the correspondents continue to cover China from other countries, while the remaining journalists in US organizations have had trouble renewing their press cards.
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Originally published as Foreign journalists in China facing ‘unprecedented’ pressure: media group
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