Government/Politics – Page 74

A Chinese Student Sentenced for Six Months for Posting Cartoon Making Fun of Xi Jinping in the U.S.

During his studies at the University of Minnesota, Luo Daiqing, from China, posted Cartoons on Twitter. After he returned to China, he was arrested and later sentenced for his posting.

Luo posted Lawrence Limburger, the primary villain of Cartoon Biker Mice from Mars, along with quotes from Xi Jinping’s speech given in October 2018. In the Chinese government’s view, Lawrence Limburger, who is similar to Winnie the Pooh, is taboo because that is considered to be the same as referring to Xi Jinping.

Luo visited his home in Wuhan City, Hubei Province in May 2019. He was called into the police office for questioning on July 12. Then he was put under administrative detention for 10 days. He was formally detained after the administrative detention was over. He was approved for arrest on August 29 and sentenced to six months in prison on November 5, 2019.

The verdict that the Wuchang District Court, Wuhan City, released on January 22, 2020, claimed, “(Luo) used the Internet to post fake images and words to defame the national image and damage the order of social management.” He was charged with creating a disturbance under Article 293 of the Criminal Law.

A student commented that, since Luo did the posting on a U.S. website when he was in the U.S., this case showed that the Chinese Communist Party is imposing Internet control over the U.S. network and managing people’s speech in the United States.

Source: Radio Free Asia, January 23, 2020
https://www.rfa.org/cantonese/news/pooh-01232020082715.html

Briefings | | February 4, 2020 | Government/Politics

China’s Ambassadors Failed to Raise Money from German Businesses for a Pro-China Portal

German national television recently reported that two of China’s Ambassadors to Germany asked German businesses for money to finance a portal supporting Beijing.

The idea of the portal, named “China reporter,” was from Wolfgang Hirn, editor of Manager magazine and Georg Blume, a free-lance writer for Times and Der Spiegel. Both are viewed as “experts on China” in the German media circle.

Shi Mingde, the previous Chinese Ambassador to Germany, had been trying to raise money for this project. On February 28, 2019, his last day as Ambassador, he even wrote fund-raising letters to large foundations and companies listed on Dax.

His successor Wu Ken sent his letter on December 4, 2019, a few days after the media exposed the Communist regime’s systematic arrests of Uyghurs in Xinjiang. “Since the German media did one-sided reporting (criticizing the CCP), it has become a more urgent need to spread a full and better image of China.”

According to the German media’s investigation, none of the foundations or companies that received the Ambassador’s letters provided funds. However, it is quite shocking that the CCP even asked German businesses for money for it to influence public opinion in Germany.

Source: Epoch Times, January 21, 2020
https://www.epochtimes.com/gb/20/1/20/n11808274.htm

Briefings | | February 2, 2020 | Economy/Resources Geo-Strategic Trend Government/Politics

China Revised Down Its 2018 GDP Numbers to Show Growth in 2019

Recently Beijing “uniformly” arranged its work to review and revise its 2018 economic data fully, so that the GDP number in 2019 could still show growth.

On January 22, the Tianjin Statistics Department published Tianjin’s GDP in 2019 as 1.41 trillion yuan (US $200 billion). It also had a small footnote: “According to the National Statistics Bureau’s uniform arrangement, Tianjin’s GDP in 2018 is revised to 1.34 trillion yuan.” That was a dramatic cut of 29 percent from the previously claimed number of 1.88 trillion yuan. This revision gave Tianjin 5.5 percent GDP growth in 2019. (Editor’s note: However, the sharp drop in the 2018 number would mean Tianjin’s GDP growth from 2017 would be quite negative, unless the authorities revised down the 2017 number, and then as a chain reaction, revised down the 2016 number. … Anyhow, this showed that China’s GDP number and its impressive high growth could just be a mirage that the communist regime created.)

The Jilin Provincial Statistics Department reported a GDP of 1.17 trillion yuan in 2019. It cut its 2018 GDP number down by 25 percent to 1.13 trillion yuan, so that it could show a 4.2 percent increase in 2019.

Shandong Province revised down its 2018 number by 13 percent. The Liaoning Province reduction was 7 percent. Heilongjiang Province was down 21.5 percent.

Source: Epoch Times, January 23, 2020
https://www.epochtimes.com/gb/20/1/23/n11815506.htm

Briefings | | January 30, 2020 | Economy/Resources Government/Politics

Wuhan Epidemic Highlights Deficiency of China’s Political System

A World Journal editorial commented on the problem of China’s political system as reflected in the Wuhan epidemic.

“First, there is a huge problem in the top-down system: On the evening of the 20th, Xi Jinping delivered a speech on CCTV regarding the new coronavirus, requiring local governments to do a good job of prevention and control to maintain stability. After his speech, great changes took place in the entire Chinese officialdom. Wuhan and other parts of the country immediately released the information on new infections, and the figures kept jumping every day. It was in sharp contrast with the downplay and cover-up of the epidemic that was in place before Xi’s speech.”

“Xi Jinping spoke because the truth could no longer be covered up. Why was there such a huge change before and after the speech? It is because the central government exercises strict control and implements a top-down system. Any major event must be reported level by level. Lower-level officials have no decision-making power and must report to higher authorities in order to obtain approval. Wuhan’s municipal health bureau has no right to declare the epidemic situation and must report to the provincial government; the governor and the Party chief of the province then report to the central authorities and finally the report reaches Xi Jinping’s confidants. Xi’s confidants have to be well prepared before deciding how to inform Xi. Usually the lower-level officials choose to report what their superior like to hear. Such a top-down system and lengthy reporting process is the reason why Xi was briefed a month after the outbreak of the virus. This shows how the delays in the decision-making process have caused the epidemic to spread rapidly.”

“Second, the politicization of health care is an issue. In a free and equal society, physicians and nurses each have their own specialties and make their own judgments about conditions. However, under the Chinese Communist system, professional judgments on medical care must give way to politics. Officials should first consider whether the news will cause social unrest. Then they have to consider whether the news will cause their superiors to be dissatisfied. That would affect their careers. When the medical process is politicized, the facts of the situation are not the basis for decision making. Hence all decisions will go bad. This is the reason why the Wuhan municipal government downplayed and covered up the epidemic before Xi Jinping’s speech.”

Source: World Journal, January 26, 2020
https://www.worldjournal.com/6753001/

Briefings | | January 30, 2020 | Government/Politics

China Is Chasing Wuhan “Fugitives” across the Country

A few million people from Wuhan, which was the epicenter of the new coronavirus, had left the city before the lockdown on January 23. As a result, recently, many cities in China have started a wave of searching for people from Wuhan to quarantine them, regardless of whether they have symptoms. The fear is that the virus can have an incubation period of up to 14 days and the host can be contagious during that period.

In the eyes of the people in other cities, all people from Wuhan are criminals. They can only prove their innocence and regain their freedom after going through a 14-day quarantine that the destination government forcibly imposes on them.

Epoch Times collected several videos and pictures from the Internet showing how the local governments, throughout the nation, have been capturing the Wuhan “fugitives.”

One video showed that police and medical staff members were putting people from Wuhan into a car. A man jumped out of the car and shouted that he was just fine. The police then locked his neck from the back in order to control him.
Another video showed that a man from Wuhan stayed at a hotel. Despite the fact that he had been very cooperative with the authorities in taking many tests, the owner accused him of “lacking public morality” because his staying there scared other guests. The man was furious, “How can you say all people from Wuhan have no public morality?”
A photo showed an emergency notice posted at a gas station. It stated, “According to the city government’s notice, each gas station must implement the following protection and control measures: 1. Any car with a Wuhan license plate is not allowed to fill up with gas.”

Source: Epoch Times, January 26, 2019
https://hk.epochtimes.com/news/2020-01-26/7012343

Briefings | | January 29, 2020 | Government/Politics Social Stability

A Young man in Wuhan Created a Video Appealing for International Help

A young man from Wuhan, who was locked down in the city which has suffered from the outbreak of the new coronavirus, posted a video on YouTube. He said that it took quite an effort for him to get beyond China’s Internet blockade in order to post it, but he could no longer be silent and had to speak out.

The following are some highlights of his talking points in the video:

“Gas stations are closed to cars and public transportation has stopped. If your family member has high blood pressure or has a heart attack and needs to go to the hospital, how can he get there? Calls to the emergency number 120 (equivalent to 114 or 911 in the U.S.) do not go through at all.”

“If you suspect that you caught pneumonia and want to go to hospital for a test, how can you get there? The hospitals are fully packed. Doctors will just tell you to wait in line, but no one will come to take care of you even if you stay in line for several hours. Maybe you were fine before you got there, but waiting in line there might get you infected.”

“On January 22, I saw many people were on the street the day before the city was locked down, and most of them weren’t wearing a mask (because the government didn’t advise people to do so). What are the Mayor and the Party Secretary doing? Didn’t they know the information already? Why didn’t they require everyone to wear a mask to protect themselves?”

“The medical system is in chaos. My friends at the hospitals told me that the treatment for patients was just to give them some anti-inflammatory or hormone injection and then let them wait for death. Many patients who had the suspected infection were told to go home, since the hospital did not have a test-kit to test them. Isn’t this government or medical institution asking the infectious source to go out into the community to infect others?”

“Wuhan is like hell now.”

“We, the people in our 20’s and 30’s, understand very clearly about China (and the communist party), but we don’t have the capability (to change it). We don’t have a channel to voice our opinions. We are just flesh and we cannot fight steel, bullets, and tanks.”

“Not everyone in China has been brainwashed. We want to live our lives under democracy and freedom. We want to access YouTube and Twitter directly, without using an anti-blockade software, but we just don’t have that. What can we do?”

“At this moment, we, the Wuhan people urgently need help from the international society. We ourselves are helpless…”

Source: Radio France International, January 26, 2020
http://www.rfi.fr/cn/中国/20200126-视频武汉青年冒死求救-痛骂中共领导人青海作秀

Briefings | | January 29, 2020 | Government/Politics Social Stability

CCP’s Mouthpiece Media Cared More about Party Event Than Wuhan Epidemic

Voice of America reported that the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP’s) main media covered quite a lot about the party event on celebrating the Chinese New Year, while it paid very little attention to the Wuhan lockdown and the coronavirus epidemic. On January 24, the first day that the Chinese media took the time to report on the Wuhan lockdown, the front page of People’s Daily didn’t mention Wuhan or the epidemic at all. Instead it covered the CCP Central Committee’s celebration of the Chinese New Year and Xi Jinping’s speech at the celebration. Xi didn’t mention Wuhan in his speech either. Neither did the second and third pages mention Wuhan.

The fourth page had an article about the epidemic on the lower part of the page. The main point was, “From the CCP Central to the local area, from the medical staff to the general public, with the common goal of conquering the epidemic, people have formed a strong force to prevent and control it.” It also said that there are plenty of supplies, food, and medical materials for Wuhan. It didn’t mention the number of infected cases, the latest developments in the epidemic, or what measures the government plans to take to control the epidemic.

Guangming Daily, another party mouthpiece, Economic Daily (under the State Council) and PLA Daily all had a similar focus in their reporting. Wuhan was only mentioned on a not-so-important page.

Unlike the communist media, the Western media have maintained a main focus on the Wuhan lockdown and on the epidemic. On January 23, the Wall Street Journal had a Wuhan epidemic image in the center of its front page, with the title, “China Locks Down City of 11 Million Where the Virus Originated.” The New York Times had, “China Closes off City at the Center of Virus Outbreak” on its front page. Financial Times also gave the news a significant focus. On January 24, Financial Times, the Washington Post, and the New York Times put the epidemic on their front pages.

Hu Ping, a Chinese political commentator said this shows that the media outside of China truly cares about Wuhan and its people.

Xi Jinping gave an important direction on January 20 regarding the epidemic: “(We) must strengthen the guidance of public opinion, strengthen the spreading and explanation of relevant policies and measures, and resolutely maintain the stability of society to ensure people remain calm and peaceful during the Chinese New Year holidays.”

Source: Voice of America, January 25, 2020
https://www.voachinese.com/a/wuhan-coronavirus-party-newspaper-20200124/5259482.html

Briefings | | January 28, 2020 | Economy/Resources Government/Politics

Government/Politics - 74. page

A Chinese Student Sentenced for Six Months for Posting Cartoon Making Fun of Xi Jinping in the U.S.

China’s Ambassadors Failed to Raise Money from German Businesses for a Pro-China Portal

China Revised Down Its 2018 GDP Numbers to Show Growth in 2019

Wuhan Epidemic Highlights Deficiency of China’s Political System

CCP’s Mouthpiece Media Cared More about Party Event Than Wuhan Epidemic

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