CNET News – 10/31/06:

While many countries block off some Web sites, China has long drawn heightened scrutiny because of the breadth and sophistication of its Internet censorship.

Which is why it came as a surprise on Tuesday when a Chinese government official claimed at a United Nations summit here that no Net censorship existed at all.

Read on for excerpts from the Chinese government official:

In China, we don’t have software blocking Internet sites. Sometimes we have trouble accessing them. But that’s a different problem. I know that some colleagues listen to the BBC in their offices from the Webcast. And I’ve heard people say that the BBC is not available in China or that it’s blocked. I’m sure I don’t know why people say this kind of thing. We do not have restrictions at all.

Some people say that there are journalists in China that have been arrested. We have hundreds of journalists in China, and some of them have legal problems. It has nothing to do with freedom of expression.



  1. Angel H. Wong says:

    China is a wet dream for Hard core Right Wing politicians, ’nuff said.

  2. Named says:

    China is the perfect merger or corporatism and state power. It is the new Third Way.

  3. Mike Voice says:

    The best lies have some percentage of truth?

    In China, we don’t have software blocking Internet sites.

    Key word being “software”. They bought tons of Cosco’s routers, which do the blocking in hardware… Or is it just that Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft doing the deed for them…
    http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0909/p01s03-woap.html

    Google has agreed with authorities to censor its Chinese search engine, for example, as has Yahoo. Microsoft launched a Chinese blog service that forbits users from using certain words.

    It has nothing to do with freedom of expression.

    Of course not!

    It is all about state secrets, or who knows what…. when charges aren’t even filed?????
    http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0909/p01s03-woap.html

    The content of state secrets in Chinese law … goes far beyond ordinary definitions of national security to encompass, in fact, most information handled by the government

    Authorities tracked Liu Di to her college and had the administrators reveal her identity through her IP address. She was then held for more than a year, without charges, before being released.

  4. Bob says:

    It’s just another liberal paradise. No matter where it’s tried liberalism always fails. Elite snobs Like John Kerry run everything. Humm, don’t see anything here about how he looks down his nose at those that are protecting him.

  5. OhForTheLoveOf says:

    The population of China is 1.3 billion…

    We have hundreds of journalists in China, and some of them have legal problems.

    Hundreds? In a population of 1.3 billion? If true, there aren’t nearly enough journalists… It is amazing that China, the undisputed world champion nation in Olymic Lies and Deception competitions, could be so brazenly bad about lying on a professional level.

  6. woodie says:

    I don’t want to fake you out,
    Take or shake or forsake you out,
    I ain’t lookin’ for you to feel like me,
    See like me or be like me.
    All I really want to do
    Is, baby, be friends with you.

    But, of course, that ain’t true if you’re a proud ‘Murican.

  7. Mr. H. Fusion says:

    And of coarse, the effete snobs like Bob here are just so envious that they don’t live in such a paradise.

  8. Jägermeister says:

    And Lao Gai doesn’t exist either… The Chinese Government has always been full of shit. 🙁

  9. doug says:

    “Dictatorship Lies About Being A Dictatorship”

    another shocker.

  10. Mr. H. Fusion says:

    #9, it almost makes you wonder

  11. WokTiny says:

    And yet, when I was in China, I felt safer than in America.

  12. SN says:

    “And yet, when I was in China, I felt safer than in America.”

    Only an idiot would confuse safety with freedom. The safest place would probably be solitary confinement in a prison. But who would want to live there?!

  13. Mike Voice says:

    11 And yet, when I was in China, I felt safer than in America.

    Which areas in China compared to which areas in the US?

    I remember the LA Olympics in 1984…
    http://tinyurl.com/yx4m4h

    Although a revenge boycott led by the Soviet Union depleted the field in certain sports…

    Some of the foreign press were covering LAPD activities, and going into gun shops to show how easy it was to buy a gun in America…

  14. Greg Allen says:

    This just makes me say — again — that we need a new Internet. One that is designed, from the ground up, for security and privacy.

    I used to think that the Internet would be, ultimately, uncontrollable. But China — and my own country — have made me believe that the Internet will eventually be controlled by governments.

    So, while the old Internet is still open, we “folks” need to start designing a new one. — one that can’t be controlled by governments or clogged by scamming spammers or dominated by corporations.


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