| Press
Freedom in China
 Author:
Luke Brown
Posted: 14 December,
2002
Reading the English version
of China's People's Daily on the Internet, one gets the heartening
impression that the Chinese government is tackling the growing AIDS
crisis head on. Headlines like "Facing
AIDS, Silence is Death" and "China
Warned of 12 Million HIV Carriers in 8 Years if no Measures Taken"
attest to this new openness. Indeed the Daily heralded China's
marking of World Aids day recently:
The first HIV carrier
to ever address a national ceremony at the Great Hall of the People
in Beijing spoke before a crowd of top health officials, experts
and students to mark World AIDS Day Sunday.
"HIV/AIDS patients
look forward to a life just like everyone else,'' said the young
man known as Xiao Wei. "We want to love and be loved.''
Xiao Wei was invited
to the ceremony along with Lao Ji, who is also infected with HIV.
They are both from Northwest China's Shaanxi Province and were infected
with the virus after they came into contact with tainted medical
supplies when they sold blood to an illegal blood centre.
But as usual when it
comes to the official media in China the truth is rather different.
What the article does not mention in tandem with the "tainted
medical supplies" disaster is the fact that another province,
Henan, has had similar problems, in no small part due to
the authorities, this being revealed by, amongst others, Wan
Yanhai, an AIDS activist. On August 24, Mr Wan was arrested
by the government for leaking an official report highlighting the
appalling state of affairs in Henan and posting it on the Internet.
He was released on 20 September after "confessing"
to leaking state "secrets." (The kick in the guts in the
Daily puff piece is the quote of Xiao Wei wanting to be loved;
something the State is incapable of, despite what it says.)
The case of Mr Wan is
all too familiar in China, where dissidents of all kinds are quickly
stood on. The latest victim of Beijing's repression is a 22-year
old Beijing University student, Liu Di, who was arrested
over a month ago due to alleged "illegal" activity (code
for trying to be herself) and posting essays on the internet critical
of the current system and regime. ("People should stop going
to political study sessions, stop watching the news on TV or reading
the party mouthpiece People's Daily and only read "reactionary"
material, she suggested.") She is, according to Reporters
Without Borders, one
of 32 "cyber-dissidents" now being held in China (16 have
been given prison sentences). When the authorities are not busy
with cracking down on whoever isn't playing ball in Xinjiang,
Tibet or Hong
Kong, taking
bribes, locking up Falun Gong members,
defending the "image" of Chairman Mao that is being, oh
dear, damaged by the Maoists in Nepal (they're not bloodthirsty
or callous enough, I can only presume), they're jamming
foreign radio stations, harassing and jailing journalists
and blocking foreign internet sites.
Another day in paradise.
Author: Luke Brown
Email: editor@polosbastards.com
Relevant links:
http://www.rsf.org/
http://www.cpj.org/
http://www.ifj.org/
http://www.ifex.org/
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