French journalist forced to leave China

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson yesterday confirmed that press credentials for a French journalist Ursula Gauthier has not been renewed for her comments regarding terrorism in Xinjiang.

“Given that Gauthier failed to make a serious apology to the Chinese people for her wrongful speech advocating for terrorism acts, it is no longer appropriate for her to continue working in China”.

If her press card is not renewed, Gauthier can not apply for a new visa, forcing her to leave China.

On Nov. 18, Gauthier – the Beijing-based correspondent for French news magazine L’Obs – wrote that China had no basis in the comparison.

She will be the first journalist kicked out of China since Melissa Chan, an American reporter for Al Jazeera, who was forced to leave in 2012.

The move has been met with widespread criticism from the French government, press watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) and Gauthier s employer.

China says it will impose new restrictions on media reports about terrorism, as it continued to deride a French journalist being expelled after questioning the government’s terrorism claims.

Whether Gauthier admits or not, her fact-distorting article equates to justifying terror attacks in Xinjiang, and that is something very welcomed by terror plotters inside China, and possibly in other parts of the world.

The new law also restricts the right of media to report on details of terror attacks, including a provision that media and social media can not report on details of terror activities that might lead to imitation, nor show scenes that are “cruel and inhuman”.

Beijing has asserted that China is a victim of global terrorism following violent ethnic clashes involving members of the Muslim minority Uighur community in the far northwest region of Xinjiang.

The Chinese government has effectively expelled a French journalist who suggested in an article that China’s outspoken solidarity with France following the November 13 terrorist attacks in Paris carried “ulterior motives”.

Gauthier said she wasn’t sure why the editor of the Global Times and the Foreign Ministry had singled her out so forcefully. “If it were true, if I was really supporting terrorism, I should have been indicted because it is a crime”, she said.

Advocacy groups have argued that the violence is more likely to be a response to Beijing’s suppressive policies in Xinjiang.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei said he was “dissatisfied” with the US position and hoped they respected China’s law-making process and did not adopt “double standards”.

By then, state media had launched an abusive and intimidating campaign against Ms Gauthier, accusing her of having deep prejudice against China and having hurt the feelings of the Chinese people. Journalists for the New York Times and Bloomberg News were also denied visas after publishing prize-winning stories about the wealth of China’s top leaders and their families.