King of Bans

[Revenge]

Chinese university bans Christmas for being 'kitsch'

PUBLISHED : Thursday, 25 December, 2014, 2:39pm
UPDATED : Thursday, 25 December, 2014, 2:39pm

Reuters in Beijing

A contestant wearing a Santa Claus costume rides in a sledge pulled by a reindeer during a race at a local winter festival in Genhe of Hulun Buir, north China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, December 24, 2014. Photo: Reuters

A university in northwestern China has banned Christmas, calling it a "kitsch" foreign celebration unbefitting of the country's own traditions and making its students watch propaganda films instead, media said on Thursday.

The Beijing News daily newspaper said that the Modern College of Northwest University, located in Xi'an, had strung up banners around the campus reading "Strive to be outstanding sons and daughters of China, oppose kitsch Western holidays" and "Resist the expansion of Western culture".

A student told the newspaper that they would be punished if they did not attend a mandatory three-hour screening of propaganda films, which other students said included one about Confucius, with teachers standing guard to stop people leaving.

"There's nothing we can do about it, we can't escape," the student was quoted as saying.

An official microblog belonging to one of the university's Communist Party's committees posted comments calling for students not to "fawn on foreigners" and pay more attention to China's holidays, like Spring Festival.

"In recent years, more and more Chinese have started to attach importance to Western festivals," it wrote.

"In their eyes, the West is more developed than China, and they think that their holidays are more elegant than ours, even that Western festivals are very fashionable and China's traditional festivals are old fashioned."

Christmas is not a traditional festival in officially atheist China but is growing in popularity, especially in more metropolitan areas where young people go out to celebrate, give gifts and decorate their homes.

Wenzhou, a city in the wealthy eastern province of Zhejiang, has banned all Christmas activities in schools and kindergartens, the official Xinhua news agency reported. Inspectors would make sure rules are enforced, it added.

The rules are meant to counteract an "obsession" with Western holidays at the expense of Chinese ones, an official at the city's education bureau told Xinhua.

 

[MirrorMan]

Gmail blocked in China

By Paul Carsten
BEIJING Mon Dec 29, 2014 2:52am EST

(Reuters) - Google Inc's Gmail was blocked in China after months of disruptions to the world's biggest email service, with an anti-censorship advocate suggesting the Great Firewall was to blame.

Large numbers of Gmail web addresses were cut off in China on Friday, said GreatFire.org, a China-based freedom of speech advocacy group. Users said the service was still down on Monday.

"I think the government is just trying to further eliminate Google's presence in China and even weaken its market overseas," said a member of GreatFire.org, who uses a pseudonym.

"Imagine if Gmail users might not get through to Chinese clients. Many people outside China might be forced to switch away from Gmail."

Google's own Transparency Report, which shows real-time traffic to Google services, displayed a sharp drop-off in traffic to Gmail from China on Friday.

"We've checked and there's nothing wrong on our end," a Singapore-based spokesman for Google said in an email.

Almost all of Google's services have been heavily disrupted in China since June this year, but until last week Gmail users could still access emails downloaded via protocols like IMAP, SMTP and POP3. These had let people communicate using Gmail on apps like the Apple iPhone's Mail and Microsoft Outlook.

China maintains tight control over the internet, nipping in the bud any signs of dissent or challenges to the ruling Communist Party's leadership.

The country is host to the world's most sophisticated internet censorship mechanism, known as the Great Firewall of China. Critics say China has stepped up its disruption of foreign online services like Google over the past year to create an internet cut off from the rest of the world.

The Google disruption began in the run-up to the 25th anniversary of the government's bloody crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators around Beijing's Tiananmen Square on June 4, 1989.

Gmail's setback could make email communication difficult for companies operating in China which use Google's Gmail for their corporate email system, said GreatFire.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said she did not know anything about Gmail being blocked, adding that the government was committed to providing a good business environment for foreign investors.

"China has consistently had a welcoming and supportive attitude towards foreign investors doing legitimate business here," she said. "We will, as always, provide an open, transparent and good environment for foreign companies in China."

One popular way for companies and people to get around China's internet censorship is to use a Virtual Private Network (VPN) which allows unhindered access to blocked sites and services.

"It's becoming harder and harder to connect and do work in China when services like Gmail are being blocked," said Zach Smith, a Beijing-based digital products manager at City Weekend magazine. "Using a VPN seems to be the only answer to doing anything these days online in China."

(Additional reporting by Ben Blanchard; Editing by Nick Macfie)

 

[MirrorMan]

Chinese Christians forced to celebrate Christmas in secret

Members of illegal churches in China fear they face stronger crackdowns from the authorities as the government adopts a more nationalist tone

PUBLISHED : Monday, 29 December, 2014, 1:42pm
UPDATED : Tuesday, 30 December, 2014, 10:47am

Agence France-Presse in Beijing

Clergy taking part in an officially sanctioned Christmas service in Beijing this year. Members of illegal churches, not recognised by the authorities, often meet in people's homes. Photo: Associated Press

A group of Christians gathered in an apartment above a Beijing dental surgery on Christmas Eve, the atmosphere jubilant as a choir belted out carols, but the curtains had to remain tightly closed.

Unofficial Christian groups have long been subject to crackdowns, but the atmosphere appears to be worsening as their numbers increase and the governing Communist Party takes a more nationalist tone under President Xi Jinping.

Members of Shouwang, a Beijing Christian group who held the Christmas Eve service, have faced more trouble than most.

Several pastors from the group, which at its height boasted about 1,000 mainly middle class members, have been under house arrest since they tried to arrange Easter services in a public square in 2011.

Nonetheless there was a joyful atmosphere in the 12th storey apartment this Christmas where green and silver tinsel hung beside plastic snowflakes and several dozen worshippers joined in with Chinese versions of the traditional carols Away in a Manger and Noel, Noel.

“Things have got worse this year because the police started to detain us. I was detained for a week,” said Zhao Sheng, 54, musical organiser for the service.

“But Christmas is still a happy time. No matter what happens, God is with us,” he added with a grin.

You Zhanglao, one of those under house arrest, said in a telephone interview that he had celebrated Christmas at home with his family by saying prayers.

Christianity has aroused suspicions in China since the 19th century when it was spread by foreign missionaries who often worked alongside colonial European powers.

China’s Communist party is officially atheist and effectively banned the religion during the 1960s, but the Christian population has swelled at rates of up to 10 per cent each year since restrictions were relaxed about thirty years ago.

The country is now home to an estimated 70 million Christians, according to a 2011 survey by the Pew Research Centre, as people search for a sense of community and meaning in a fast-changing society.

The vast majority of Chinese Protestants, about 50 million, according to the survey, shun state-run churches and worship in self-organising groups outside government control.

These underground churches are technically illegal, giving the authorities a pretext to crack down if they wish.

Local authorities who have long tolerated underground churches have taken a harder line this year.

This summer in the eastern city of Wenzhou, sometimes known as “China’s Jerusalem” because of its large Christian population, police stormed churches to force the removal of crosses.

The crackdown affected more than 400 churches in eastern Zhejiang province, according to the US-based rights group China Aid, with some churches completely demolished.

The authorities said the churches had breached building regulations.

In the strongest sign of official fears so far, top religious official Wang Zuoan told worshippers at Beijing churches to “resolutely resist the use of Christianity by foreigners to infiltrate China”, according to the state-run China News Service.

Experts say the Christian conception of universal values fits uncomfortably with the Communist Party’s insistence that China cannot be judged by foreign standards.

Richard Madsen, an expert on Chinese Christians at the University of California, San Diego, said there seemed to be a new move to try to suppress churches.

“It’s connected with the nationalism of China’s government and concerns that this is a foreign religion with connections around the world,” he said.

Since coming to power in 2012, President Xi has praised the ancient Confucian moral system and met top Buddhist figures.

China’s leaders “hope the revival of traditional religions like Taoism and Buddhism will help crowd-out Christianity”, Madsen said.

Just four days before Christmas, the authorities in Zhejiang clashed with locals as they tore down a church cross, China Aid cited parishioners as saying.

“We are praying that the situation improves for us next year,” said Wu Changyi, a Christian in Wenzhou.

But despite tighter controls, most house churches have been able to operate with few disruptions, according to Yang Fenggang, an expert at Perdue University in Indiana in the United States, adding there were too many to be suppressed.

Since the government seized their worship space three years ago, members of Shouwang gather in apartments rented by the smaller “New Tree” church, which has reached an accommodation with the local authorities.

“We are relatively free, but it’s still relative freedom,” said New Tree Pastor Wang Shuangyan, who led a Christmas Eve service where she baptised five new members.

“Faith brings peace to the heart,” said 25-year-old student Cheng Xiaohui, who knelt on the ground as Wang poured water over her head.

New Tree members said their church was often visited by the police, but had avoided suppression because it is relatively small and holds its services in private.

At Shouwang’s separate service, a middle aged preacher expounded for nearly an hour about the meaning of the Bible, creationism, the nature of sin and redemption.

But as if underlining the Communist Party’s fears, his sermon briefly touched on politics.

“In those countries like the Soviet Union, North Korea, and China that put humans at the centre of everything, the human rights situation is poor, or even very poor,” the preacher said.

At the close of his speech, the curtains were pulled open, filling the room with light, while cries of “God bless you” filled the room as worshippers shook hands and embraced.

“We don’t need to be careful” a 43 year-old woman surnamed Su said when asked about police pressure. “God will protect us.”

 

[MirrorMan]

Film director jailed in China for making documentary about the constitution

Shen Yongping convicted of illegal business activities. His lawyer has suggested the charge was politically motivated

PUBLISHED : Tuesday, 30 December, 2014, 2:51pm
UPDATED : Tuesday, 30 December, 2014, 2:51pm

Agence France-Presse in Beijing

A cinema in Beijing. Film production is tightly controlled by the censors in China. Photo: AFP

A court in China on Tuesday sentenced a film director who made a documentary about constitutionalism to one year in prison for “illegal business activities”, his lawyer said.

Shen Yongping’s A Hundred Years of Constitutionalism is about the history of failed attempts to establish the rule of constitutional law in China where the Communist Party has been in power since 1949.

DVDs were distributed for free and Shen had planned to post the documentary online as a free download, his lawyer Zhang Xuezhong said.

“This charge is ridiculous. He didn’t want to make any money from this film. If anything he lost money making it,” Zhang said.

“But at least this sentence is shorter than most, mainly due to the fact that Shen was less defiant than others have been in the past.”

Shen’s conviction comes less than a month after China celebrated its first national Constitution day and in the wake of a meeting of top Communist Party officials that decreed it is a fundamental requirement to ensure the rule of law.

The country’s constitution states: “Citizens of the People’s Republic of China enjoy freedom of speech, of the press, of assembly, of association, of procession and of demonstration.”

But the governing party maintains a tight grip on expression, with protests regularly quashed and human rights lawyers and activists coming under increasing pressure since President Xi Jinping took power two years ago.

Beijing’s Bureau of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television said 4,000 copies of the film found at Shen’s apartment were illegal publications, according to a copy of the charges posted online.

The government harassed Shen throughout the filming process and repeatedly discouraged him from making the documentary, his lawyer said.

Shen has already been held for eight months, he added.

 

[VPutin]

Vladimir Putin bans transsexuals from driving

Russia decides that transsexuals, transvestites and sexual fetishists could prove dangerous to other drivers on the road

The law does not describe how an individual’s sexual preference might impede their ability to drive safely Photo: Getty Images

By Roland Oliphant, Moscow
11:21AM GMT 09 Jan 2015

Russian lawyers have attacked draconian new road safety laws that ban transsexuals from receiving driving licences.

In a bizarre amendment to the law published on Thursday, transsexualism and transvestism and are named as health conditions that could prove dangerous to drivers.

The new rules are listed in a decree on road safety signed by Dmitry Medvedev, the prime minister, which is aimed at reducing fatalities from traffic accidents by banning those with certain disabilities from driving.

Groups now barred from driving include limb amputees, those with hereditary eye diseases, and people shorter than 150cm (4'9").

Also barred are those suffering from what the law calls “personality and behaviour disorders,” including “disorders of sexual preference.”

Fetishism, exhibitionism, and voyuerism are also on the list of proclivities deemed unsafe on the roads, as are “disorders” associated with sexual development and orientation.

And the new law does not only target sexual vices. Gambling addicts and kleptomaniacs - or compulsive stealers - may also be denied licences.

The law does not describe how an individual’s sexual preference might impede their ability to drive safely.

Nor is it clear how the laws would be enforced.

But a Russian lawyers organisation has warned that if taken literally it would allow the authorities to intrude into individual’s private lives and even open the way for “denunciations” of genderqueer individuals to the police.

The Association of Russian Lawyers for Human Rights warned that the law effectively bans “all transgender people, bigender, asexuals, transvestites, cross-dressers, and people who need sex reassignment” from driving.

The group also condemned the decree for making no exception for modern prophetic limbs or customised vehicles that can allow amputees and people shorter than 150 cm to drive safely.

Yelena Masyuk, a member of the official committee that advises Vladimir Putin on human rights, said stripping people of the right to drive based on their gender identity may represent “an injustice.”

The “disorders” are drawn from the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) list of personality and behavioural disorders. The WHO has said it intends to review the inclusion of transgenderism on its own list this year.

 

[MirrorMan]

China ‘beefs up’ social media rules by forcing people to use real-name registration

PUBLISHED : Tuesday, 13 January, 2015, 5:32pm
UPDATED : Tuesday, 13 January, 2015, 7:20pm

Andrea Chen [email protected]

At the moment users of websites such as Sina Weibo do not have to register using their real names. Photo: Reuters

China is “beefing up” its social media rules by forcing people to register with their real names if they want to use the mainland’s most popular Twitter-like service, Sina Weibo, internet forums, and other websites.

The nation's Cyberspace Administration did not reveal details about how the plan would be carried out in today’s announcement.

However, a spokesman said it would be “beefing up” its enforcement to punish violators.

The real-name protocol means that even if a user is able to choose an internet nickname, he or she would need to register their real names with the website administrator.

Currently users of websites such as Weibo do not have to register with their real names.

The administration also revealed that it had recently shut down 24 websites, nine online columns, and 17 public WeChat accounts.

Officials said they had been closed because they had “posed as official media or government departments to release false information”, “carried news stories without obtaining permits from the authority” and “allowed pornographic or other illegal posts”.

Among the 24 websites were two grassroots anti-corruption websites that carried petitions backed by members of the public, who wanted to expose corruption and wrongdoings by local officials that have yet to be listed on the website of China’s anti-graft watchdog, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection.

The websites, yunluncn.com and fanfulianzheng.net, were set up by activists after their attempts to file petitions to the central government had failed.

A website of human rights activists quoted lawyer Liu Xiaoyuan as saying that Cheng Kangming, founder of fanfulianzheng.net, had been detained by the police last year after trying to file complaints to the CCDI's inspection team about the corruption of a Zhejiang official.

 

[winnipegjets]

Was in China recently and totally pissed that anything google was not usable. Could not download from playstore, could not access e-mail ...eventually, I hope people will stop visiting China.

 

[eatshitndie]

general cho is banned from hosting awards in north korea.

 

[vtran2684]

got ban sammyboy or not

 

[ControlFreak]

Female models to be banned from China car shows

Staff Reporter
2015-01-13

A model puts on a carwash show at an automobile exhibition in Shenyang, June 25, 2014. (File photo/ CNS)

A car model poses with a car in an automobile exhibition in Urumqi, Xinjiang autonomous region, Oct. 16, 2014. (File photo/CNS)

Female models are set to be banned from auto shows in China to bring the focus back to the cars, our Chinese-language sister paper Want Daily forecasts.

This would mean the end to the half-naked catwalks and pole dancing shows that have become the main attraction at China's car shows in recent years.

The organizing committee of the upcoming Shanghai International Automobile Industry Exhibition has notified all exhibitors that they are not to employ female models, according to Yang Xueliang, PR director of Zhejiang's Geely Automobile, on his Weibo on Jan. 9.

While word has spread among exhibitors and their associates, reports have it that the authorities are gearing up to kick out the scantily clad female models or booth babes who have been employed in increasing numbers and in ever shrinking outfits as exhibitors have realized that more flesh means more punters.

The downside is that the large crowds that jam the venues, with many who come for the girls and have little interest in the cars, increase security risks, according to car company staff. Crowd control is particularly in the spotlight after the tragic stampede on Shanghai's waterfront on New Year's Eve in which 36 people died.

But the government's intolerance for prurience is clearly a driving force. One auto show in Guangzhou reportedly saw models expose their pubic hair, while a show in Wuhan last year contained a show involving sex toys that even drew criticism from the state broadcaster CCTV, the report said.

Organizers of the Nanjing auto exhibitions to be held in May and October have told the press that they may follow Shanghai and ban female models.

A backlash is already brewing online. Guo Cheng, a writer, joked on Weibo that authorities "are forcing all the lustful men to become public servants."

Beijing last year cracked down on the illegal but normally tolerated sex trade in Dongguan and recently censored a popular historical TV drama for having too much cleavage.

 

[xszvscx]

Imagine a boring car show with no models.

 

[MirrorMan]

Censors close WeChat accounts for ‘spreading distorted historical information’

Over 130 accounts on the mobile phone messaging service shut down

PUBLISHED : Tuesday, 20 January, 2015, 11:43am
UPDATED : Tuesday, 20 January, 2015, 10:49pm

[email protected]

Regulators alleged the WeChat accounts spread illegal and fabricated information. Photo: Reuters

China’s top internet regulator has closed over 130 accounts on the popular messaging app WeChat that “spread distorted historical information” about the governing Communist Party and the nation’s past.

The Cyberspace Administration said the accounts, which claimed to reveal little-known historical truths and secrets, blatantly spread illegal and fabricated information.

The authority said it acted on a tip-off and after the investigation it had closed down 133 accounts, including one called “This is not History”. The statement gave no further details about the rest of the accounts that were closed.

An unnamed official at the regulator said it would step up law enforcement on the internet and continue to follow up on tip-offs from the public.

The statement came after the regulator said mainland websites had deleted more than one billion pornographic and harmful posts last year as part of a clean-up of the internet.

Among the deleted posts, 220 million were on four leading gateway websites, Sina, Sohu, Tencent and NetEase. Two major search engines Baidu and Qihoo 360 deleted 130 million posts.

The authorities also shut down about 2,200 websites and 20 million online forums, blogs and social media accounts that had spread erotic and illegal content.

Lu Wei, a former Beijing propaganda chief who took up his current role as the regulator’s head in 2013, has repeatedly defended internet censorship in China, saying it is critical in preserving domestic stability.

Users of Microsoft’s Outlook email service were subject to a hacking attack over the weekend in China, weeks after Google’s Gmail system was blocked on the mainland, an online censorship watchdog said on Monday.

“If our accusation is correct, this new attack signals that the Chinese authorities are intent on further cracking down on communication methods that they cannot readily monitor,” GreatFire.org said on its website.

 

[ControlFreak]

China blocks VPN services that let internet users get around censorship

PUBLISHED : Friday, 23 January, 2015, 4:03pm
UPDATED : Friday, 23 January, 2015, 4:31pm

Associated Press in Beijing

Reports say China is blocking VPN services that let mainland users get around online censorship to view popular websites such as Google and Facebook. Photo: Reuters

Technology specialists and companies are reporting that China is blocking VPN services that let users get around online censorship of popular websites such as Google and Facebook.

The virtual private network provider, Golden Frog, wrote on its blog that the controls have hit a wide swathe of VPN services.

Another provider, Astrill, informed its users that the controls have started hitting iPhone access to services such as Gmail this year.

The Chinese government blocks thousands of websites to prevent what it regards as politically sensitive information from reaching Chinese users.

Many foreigners in China, as well as millions of Chinese, depend on VPNs to connect to servers outside the country and access-blocked information.

China-based entrepreneur Richard Robinson said the controls have particularly hurt small- and medium-sized foreign companies.

VPN services use software that allows users to connect to other internet networks.

As data on VPN services is encrypted, other people are unable to see what users are looking at, which is why VPN services can get around efforts to block or censor certain websites.

 

[ControlFreak]

Residents’ hopes of Lunar New Year preserved pork go up in smoke

PUBLISHED : Thursday, 22 January, 2015, 2:48pm
UPDATED : Thursday, 22 January, 2015, 2:48pm

Staff reporter

Eating preserved pork and sausages is a long-held tradition in Chongqing and many households traditionally smoke bacon before Lunar New Year. Photo: Reuters

An “anti-bacon” crackdown by authorities in China has banned city residents from making smoked bacon – a traditional method of preserving pork – because it is blamed for polluting the air.

Since Tuesday Chongqing’s Environment Protection Bureau and the municipal departments of public security, city planning, food and drug administration have enforced the ban on the smoking of bacon in major districts of the city, the Xinhua news agency reported.

Eating preserved pork and sausages is a long-held tradition in Chongqing and the neighbouring Sichuan Province.

Many households make smoked bacon before Lunar New Year, which falls on February 19 this year.

Chongqing’s anti-bacon campaign came days after an official in the neighbouring city Dazhou sparked a wave of controversy by blaming the lingering smog on smoked bacon.

The bureau said the burning of materials in the open air and making “firewood chicken” – a delicacy cooked with lots of firewood – are now also prohibited.

Highly polluting burning materials will be replaced with clean energy, such as natural gas, electricity and liquefied gas.

Anyone caught violating the rules will face a fine of up to 5,000 yuan (about HK$6,300), the bureau said on its official website yesterday.

Xinhua said the Chongqing campaign had led to public ridicule and scepticism on the internet, with some netizens saying that the government “should probably ban cooking because it also generates air pollution”.

One netizen joked: “Maybe we should stop breathing because it pollutes the air.”

 

[DefJam]

Reverend tanwahtiu must have pressured the CCP

Chinese universities ordered to ban textbooks that promote Western values

The move marks the latest step in an ideological campaign that has already brought the media and internet under even tighter controls

PUBLISHED : Friday, 30 January, 2015, 11:54am
UPDATED : Friday, 30 January, 2015, 3:18pm

[email protected]

Educators turn the tassels for graduates at Zhejiang University. Chinese universities have been told to stop using books that inculcate Western ideology. Photo: Xinhua

Chinese education authorities have pledged to redouble efforts to control the use of imported textbooks in Chinese universities to stem the influence of Western values on the younger generation.

The move marks the latest step in President Xi Jinping’s ideological campaign, which has seen the media and the internet come under even tighter controls and is now being expanded to Chinese campuses.

Education Minister Yuan Guiren urged the universities to exert tighter control over the use of imported textbooks at a symposium on Thursday that was attended by the heads of leading Chinese institutes including Peking University and Tsinghua University.

Citing a joint directive from the State Council and the General Office of the Communist Party’s Central Committee, Yuan said Chinese universities must not allow books that promote Western values to be used in classes, the official Xinhua reported.

Speech of any kind that brought shame to party leaders and socialism must be banned in class, Xinhua quoted Yuan as saying. Teachers must also not grumble in class to avoid “passing on negative emotions to their students”, he added.

Earlier this month, the universities were instructed to step up propaganda and teaching of Marxism and Chinese socialism to ensure such values would “get into the students’ heads”. The institutes would be assessed on their use of set textbooks on Marxism, the authorities said.

Last Saturday, the party’s flagship journal Qiushi raised concerns about academic freedom in China after it lashed out at outspoken Peking University law professor He Weifang for defaming the Chinese legal system by spreading Western ideology.

 

[Narong Wongwan]

Chink government should ban the iphone....so that xiaomi can corner the market....

 

[MirrorMan]

Confucius Institutes ban Taiwanese from expat teacher list

Luo Yin-chong and Staff Reporter
2015-02-02

A woman poses among plastic Confucius dolls in Taipei, Dec. 23, 2014. (Photo/Xinhua)

The Confucius Institute, China's international network of Chinese-language teaching institutions, does not hire teachers from Taiwan because its mission is to promote Chinese culture and language and is considered to have a soft-power political aspect to its mission, reports our Chinese-language sister paper Want Daily.

Lee Pei-yu, a Taiwanese student enrolled at a PhD program at Peking University specializing in Chinese language teaching, said Taiwanese students are often have the illusion that they could be sent abroad by the Confucius Institute once they complete their studies, and that there is a very wide selection of jobs. This is far from the reality however, Lee says.

Representatives of Taiwan's Association of Teaching Chinese as a Second Language had urged that Taiwanese students be granted the chance to be sent abroad to teach Chinese, said Lee. Hanban officials replied that they would consider the possibility. But according to Lee, Taiwanese people are excluded, either as teachers or as volunteers.

Liu Chuan-wei, another Taiwanese student at Peking University, confirmed that all Chinese-language teachers and volunteer workers sent abroad are from mainland China and Taiwanese students are banned from such opportunities.

Lee urged China to allow Taiwanese students to exercise their teaching talent abroad. But she also admitted that most events organized by the Confucius Institute would fly the PRC flag, which might be uncomfortable for them.

Liu, who is also a PhD student, said he does not exclude any possibility of a career in China or any other country to teach Chinese. There is more opportunity to become a Chinese-language teacher in China with the increasing number of foreign nationals looking to study in a native speaker environment, he said, adding that he has not regretted studying in Beijing.

 

[MirrorMan]

Great Firewall rises: darkness descends as China tightens online censorship

Hopes fade for innovation economy as mainland tightens censorship online and in classrooms

PUBLISHED : Wednesday, 18 February, 2015, 3:01am
UPDATED : Wednesday, 18 February, 2015, 11:57am

Associated Press in Beijing

China blocked all Google services last year. Photo: Reuters

Working out of a Beijing office full of video game designers from around the world, Chinese-born Pin Wang and his startup Substantial Games should be the face of the innovative, forward-looking China that the country's leaders say they want to build.

Pin and his team are attracting investors from across China while launching online games full of swords and sorcery that they hope will dazzle global eyeballs. But for several weeks, Pin's team has struggled with a decidedly down-to-earth problem that's hit countless companies nationwide: They're unable to access their email, shared documents and other online services blocked by China's internet censors.

"Something that should take 15 seconds takes three or five minutes, and it screws with the way you flow or you work," Pin said. "We don't have the resources to move because we're a startup. But we talk about it all the time."

Chinese controls on information have tightened and loosened over the years, but Pin and others are feeling what many say is China's most severe crackdown in decades on how people learn about the world around them, talk to each other and do business.

On the internet, in college classrooms and in corporate offices, the Communist Party has raised the virtual wall separating the most populous country from the rest of the globe. Experts say it reflects a distrust of outside influences that the party thinks could threaten its control on society.

Companies that have depended for years on virtual private networks, or VPNs, to get around Chinese online censors and access business tools have seen those channels squeezed or closed since the start of the year.

Local company Weibo is censored. Photo: Bloomberg

Academics who have long helped Chinese authorities distil foreign ideas into public policy have been told to watch what they say, especially about so-called Western ideas that clash with party doctrine. And many foreign companies once welcomed into China's booming economy have had their offices raided by investigators and been fined in antitrust investigations.

Despite Chinese government pledges to create an innovation economy that leads the world, China ranked 22nd out of 50 countries, between Ireland and Spain, in a global innovation index released this month by Bloomberg financial news service.

"To have the best educational system and the best university has nothing to do with how many high-rises you have and how many good dining halls you have," said Rowena He, a Harvard University lecturer. "The most important thing at the core is the intellectual freedom that makes up life in a university and academia," she said. "But instead of opening up to reforms, we see the opposite."

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying responded to the concerns of foreign businesses by pointing to a UN report showing China became the world's top destination for foreign direct investment in 2014.

Hua also echoed previous government arguments that people online needed to first obey Chinese regulations on "healthy" internet use.

"As long as foreign companies in China observe the Chinese law and refrain from undermining China's national security and consumers' interest, China will protect their legal rights and welcome their business expansion," Hua said.

The tighter controls reflect instability within the party as President Xi Jinping shakes up the political landscape in a much-publicised anti-corruption campaign that's netted thousands of government officials, said prominent China scholar Perry Link. The strategy echoes back to the political purges of Mao Zedong , the founding father of the People's Republic of China, Link said. "Since Xi Jinping came in, the clampdown has been stronger and more unidirectional than anything since the Mao era," Link said.

Professor Xia Yeliang was among the first to feel the consequences when the economics faculty of prestigious Peking University voted to expel him in October 2013, a month before Xi took power after a lengthy, stage-managed transition. Xia had long been an advocate for democratic reforms in China and helped draft Charter 08, a bold call for sweeping changes to the political system.

Xia said more than 20 professors in China had been expelled or otherwise disciplined for their political teachings since Xi came to power. "Through my colleagues, I can sense that the ideological controls are getting much tighter," said Xia, now a visiting fellow at the libertarian US think tank the Cato Institute.

In that political climate, the government sees the internet as a top threat and has responded by building a ubiquitous system for censoring what people in China can see online. Xi presides over the powerful Central Internet Security and Information Leading Group, which formed three months after he took power.

The list of controls grows every month.

Late last year, Chinese censors finally blocked all Google services after the US company refused to cooperate with them in 2010. This month, officials required that all Chinese blog and chat room users register with their real names and promise in writing to avoid challenging the political system. In the coming weeks, new cybersecurity regulations will reportedly require foreign companies to turn over sensitive intellectual property and submit their products to security checks.

The party has paid especially close attention to the microblog Weibo and censored messages that touch on sensitive subjects, said Rogier Creemers, a research officer at Oxford University's Programme for Comparative Media Law and Policy.

"Weibo has become a venue for chaotic discussion, and part of the effect it had was it essentially meant the party had lost the initiative and couldn't say what got into the public sphere," Creemers said.

The latest moves are in line with Beijing's longtime approach to regulatory change: It eases control on commercial or other activity, sees how it develops and then promotes aspects it wants and suppresses those it doesn't.

Chinese internet users, for example, are avid consumers of social media, e-commerce and video streaming sites, even if the censors are always lurking, said Dali Yang, faculty director of the University of Chicago's centre in Beijing.

"This is a society with a tremendous level of information, people who are very well educated in terms of actual information and they know of history going back centuries," Yang said.

Still, while Chinese leaders see the internet as a source of prosperity and jobs, they are willing to give up commercial gains to enforce political controls. When the government clashed with Google, people in the industry warned that driving out the US search giant would hurt China's development.

Walling off China's internet has allowed some local websites such as search engine Baidu and Weibo to prosper in the absence of foreign competition. Other local companies, such as Pin's startup, chafe at the restrictions.

Foreign entrepreneurs and companies, meanwhile, are trying to figure out whether the costs of doing business in China outweigh the benefits of tapping the world's second-biggest economy.

Rich Chinese are also looking to leave the country. A survey by the British bank Barclays last year found that 47 per cent of more than 2,000 high-worth Chinese are hoping to move within five years. The poll found that their top reasons were greater educational and economic opportunities for their children and overall economic security.

"Beijing is an attractive place to be because of the amazing talent," said Beijing-based entrepreneur Nils Pihl, who heads the database startup Traintracks. "But it's getting harder for us to stay, and my social feed is full of other CEOs saying they're worried they will have to leave."

 

[MirrorMan]

Beijing delegates banned from ‘checking social media, playing games on phone’ at congress

Some representatives were criticised last year by the Communist Party mouthpiece the People’s Daily for ‘breach of duty’ during parliamentary sessions

PUBLISHED : Wednesday, 04 March, 2015, 11:58am
UPDATED : Wednesday, 04 March, 2015, 4:19pm

Wu Nan
[email protected]

A paramilitary police officer stands guard in Tiananmen Square near the Great Hall of the People. The National People's Congress formally opens on Thursday. Photo: Associated Press

Delegates from Beijing attending the National People’s Congress face tougher rules of conduct, according to a newspaper report, including a ban on checking social media on their mobile phones during meetings.

Delegates from the capital are also barred from smoking in public places or playing games on their mobile phones during debates and forums, the Beijing Times reports.

They also have to report to the delegation’s chief if they have to miss meetings, the report said.

The Communist Party newspaper the People’s Daily published an opinion piece last year criticising delegates at the annual parliamentary meeting in Beijing for playing games on their phones during sessions.

It described the behaviour as a breach of duty.

Delegates from the capital include government officials, company executives, university chiefs and representatives from the education, science, culture and health sectors.

The National People’s Congress opens on Thursday.

Delegates work includes studying various work reports produced by the government and the country’s legal authorities.

 

[Sprint]

China censors ban films at personal whim; delegate urges overhaul

Delegate to national political advisory body says movies are banned on the personal whims of officials and their actions need to be controlled.

PUBLISHED : Tuesday, 03 March, 2015, 10:45am
UPDATED : Wednesday, 04 March, 2015, 10:00am

Alice Yan

[email protected]

A scene featuring Mao Zedong in the historical epic The Founding of a Republic, co-written by Wang Xingdong. Photo: SCMP Pictures

A delegate on China’s national political advisory body says the system for censoring films needs to be overhauled because it is unfair and relies too heavily on the personal opinions of government officials, state media reported.

Scriptwriter Wang Xingdong, who co-wrote the screenplay for the film The Founding of a Republic, said there needs to be greater legal oversight and control of censors’ actions, Xinhua reported.

“Sometimes even if a film has been approved by the censoring committee, it can still get its broadcasting license revoked because it is disliked by some officials,” he said.
For all the latest news from China’s parliamentary sessions click here

Most films made in China are initially vetted by the authorities in the provinces or municipality where they are shot and produced.

The State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television is the main national censor.

Pilot schemes have been introduced in Jilin, Guangdong, Zhejiang, Shaanxi and Hubei to allow provincial governments to have the final say on films release.

The political advisory body the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference is holding its annual session in Beijing, starting this week.