China to Shut 200 Papers for Straying from Official Line
HONG KONG, Dec 5 (AFP) - Chinese authorities have decided to close some 200 local newspapers to reassert
control over a press they believe has strayed too far from the official line, a Hong Kong-based human rights group said
Sunday.
According to the Information Centre of Human Rights and Democratic Movement in China, the first targets will be
popular tabloids that are overshadowing large papers run by the Chinese Communist Party.
"These newspapers emphasize court cases, crime, accidents and corruption: people are buying them more and more
because they get better information than in the large national dalies," it said in a statement.
The 200 newspapers, accounting for one-tenth of the country's total, will be shut during the first half of next year,
according to an official document published at the end of last month, the centre added.
Public offices, which tend to neglect official publications such as the party's People's Daily at the expense of the
populist papers, will no longer be allowed to subscribe to the tabloids unless they renew their subscriptions to the
national papers.
The austere party newspaper, which is practically unavailable on the streets, is forcibly sold to administrations. Its
circulation has fallen this year to three million from a high of eight million several years ago.
Also targeted by the official document are publications that specialize in court cases, police, security offices and fires.
These papers will be merged so there is only one per province, autonomous region or municipality.
According to the centre, the decision has stirred strong resentment among journalists toward the party's propaganda
department, headed by Ding Guangen.
At the end of last year, Ding ordered media to adopt "a proper attitude" in 1999, the 50th anniversary of the communist
regime.
His suggestion was followed by the closure of the Cultural Times, an intellectual magazine in Canton that had operated
independently since 1993.
Source:
http://www.chinatimes.com.tw/english/epolitic/88120522.htm
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