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"IOC Allows China To Limit Reporters' Access to Internet"

"Censorship Reverses Pledge by Beijing"

By Edward Cody
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, July 31, 2008; A10

BEIJING, July 30 -- The International Olympic Committee and the
Chinese government acknowledged Wednesday that reporters covering the
Olympics will be blocked from accessing Internet sites that Chinese
authorities consider politically sensitive.

The avowed censorship, although standard procedure for China's
millions of Internet users, contradicted pledges made earlier by IOC
and Chinese officials that the estimated 20,000 journalists and
technicians due in Beijing next week for the Olympic Games would have
unfettered Web access. It was the latest in a series of steps taken by
Chinese authorities reneging on promises they made seven years ago,
when Beijing was granted the Games, to allow free reporting during the
Olympics.

In response, the Paris-based advocacy group Reporters Without Borders
issued a guide on how to use proxy servers to get around China's
censorship. The Web-based guide also advised reporters covering the
Games, which begin Aug. 8, that their telephone calls and e-mails are
liable to be monitored by Chinese security agencies.

The guide itself was blocked by China, which employs an extensive
array of monitoring software to comb through whatever people call up
on their screens and block sites that China's security or propaganda
officials consider unacceptable. Sites run by Amnesty International,
the human rights group; Falun Gong, the spiritual movement; Tibet
independence sympathizers; and a host of other human rights groups
hostile to aspects of China's Communist Party rule have been targeted
by the censorship equipment, which is backed up by an estimated 30,000
monitors employed by the Public Security Bureau.

Kevan Gosper, an IOC official with responsibilities for media
relations, told reporters in Beijing that Olympic officials had
negotiated with the Chinese government an accord under which China's
censors would continue blocking politically sensitive sites for
reporters covering the Games. The pledge of unrestricted access
applied only to sites related to the Olympic competitions, he
explained.

Sun Weide, a spokesman for the Beijing Organizing Committee for the
Olympic Games, said at a news conference that Chinese authorities
would do their best to make sure reporters could cover the Games
without hindrance, despite the censorship. He suggested the banned
topics were not part of the athletic events and should not be of
interest to reporters anyway.

Journalists at the Main Press Center, which is to house up to 5,000
reporters, raised their complaints after discovering they could not
call up an Amnesty International report issued Monday criticizing
China's human rights record leading up to the Games. They also could
not access Falun Gong sites without going through a proxy server and
said the overall speed of the Internet at the press center seemed to
be way below par.

At the Beijing International Media Center, reporters could access
Wikipedia's home page but could not search the site. Major global news
sites were available, but the British Broadcasting Corp.'s Chinese-
language site was blocked.

Because of China's extensive filtering system, which responds to a
long list of key words maintained by the Public Security Bureau, the
Internet here has long been painfully slow, particularly in areas
where monitoring is heavy.

Dennis Wilder, the White House's Asian affairs director, told
reporters in Washington he was "disappointed that they clamped down on
the Internet" in China.

"There have been questions about the access to the Internet and other
issues at the Olympic centers," he said. "We think the Chinese
government needs to heed those concerns, that if China is going to
demonstrate it is truly moving forward as a modern society, this is
part of it."

Amnesty International charged that the censorship violated China's
earlier commitments and went against the grain of the Olympics.

"The International Olympic Committee and the Beijing Organizing
Committee of the Olympic Games should fulfill their commitment to full
media freedom and provide immediate uncensored Internet access at
Olympic media venues," said Mark Allison, the group's East Asia
researcher. "Censorship of the Internet at the Games is compromising
fundamental human rights and betraying the Olympic values."

[Correspondent Jill Drew in Beijing and staff writer Dan Eggen in
Washington contributed to this report.]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/30/AR2008073000747....