CHINA'S ATTACKS ON THE MEDIA UNACCEPTABLE

       Emerging superpower's violent trampling of press freedom is a major cause for concern About a week ago, some 700 journalists in Hong Kong got together to voice their concerns over the recent assault on one of their colleagues who was sent to the restive Xianjiang region to cover the disturbances in the Muslim-majority region.
       They were calling on the Xinjiang government to apologise to the reporters and called on Beijing to do more to stop media repression and intimidation.
       On September 4, television reporter Lam Tsz-ho, and two cameraman - Lau Wing-chuen and Lam Chun-wai - were reportedly tied up and beaten by police while they were covering protests in Urumqi that erupted after a spate of needle attacks in the city.
       When the Chinese authorities broke their silence on the issue just a few days later, the Xinjiang government spokeswoman, Hou Hanmin, said the authorities regretted the incident but nevertheless blamed the journalists for inciting unrest.
       Mak Yin-ting, chairwoman of the Hong Kong Journalists Association (HKJA), called the statement "outrageous and blatantly false" allegations against the journalists.
       "This is a violent trampling of press freedom," Mak said. "It is not a single incident. Even last year, lots of our journalists were beaten up while reporting in China. The situation is getting worse now," she added.
       In August, Chinese authorities detained two Hong Kong NOW TV journalists covering the trial of rights activist Tan Zuoren.
       Police said they were looking for drugs. But after seven hours of searching the rooms they came up with noting. We never realised the Chinese authorities were so strict about illicit drugs. Perhaps they just didn't like that Tan, who led an investigation into the collapse of schools in the Sichuan earthquake, was receiving media attention.
       This past Friday, Chinese authorities assaulted three journalists from Kyodo News, a Japanese news agency, in their Beijing hotel room.
       The three were reportedly kicked and their computers destroyed by pounding on the floor. The journalists were in the Chinese capital to cover the National Day rehearsals when authorities stormed into the room.
       They chose the hotel so they could get a good view of the Tiananmen Square, the venue for the upcoming 60th National Day celebration scheduled for October 1.
       On this day columns of tanks and assorted other military vehicles bearing missiles and an array of other military hardware will rumble down the Avenue of Heavenly Peace as they make their way towards the square.
       Naturally, they wanted a good view. But the authorities thought they had violated a government order to all journalists that they were not permitted to photograph the rehearsal in spite of the fact that it was being conducted out in the open.
       It is difficult to understand the logic of such an order. Was the Beijing government afraid that somehow pictures of the rehearsals will detract from the actual event?
       Or was it because they just didn't like the fact that somebody out there might be violating their order?
       In this day and age where just about every mobile phone has a built-in camera, the idea of keeping such an enormous public event, rehearsal or not, a state secret is nothing less than absurd.
       We really hope that the authorities didn't beat up the Kyodo reporters and cameramen because they were working for a Japanese news agency.
       For a country that has been billed as an emerging superpower, which is looking to strengthen ties with countries abroad, it is disturbing that the Communist giant does not understand that press freedom is the cornerstone of society.
       Beating up journalists, regardless of what outfit they are working for, is, indeed, a non-starter.
       The attacks against reporters in Xinjiang and in Hong Kong were not the first and probably will not be the last. The world community and the media industry needs to applaud the reporters in Hong Kong, including the Foreign Correspondents' Club there, for speaking out against such behaviour.
       "It is the first time the entire spectrum of Hong Kong society, including senior government officials and National People's Congress delegates, have condemned such treatment of reporters," the club's president Tom Mitchell was reported by Agence-France Presse as saying.
       Let's hope that the Beijing government takes notice.