双语新闻：外交部发言人中国不存在新闻审查制度

2013-01-08 00:00:00来源：新东方网

　　A clash between China's censors and two of the country's respected media outlets has cast doubts on the new centralleadership's promise of greater openness.

　　The Guangzhou-based Southern Weekendsaw its New Yearmessage - which made the case for stronger constitutional rulein China - altered at the last minute by Guangdong's provincialpropaganda chief.

　　The act triggered an online furore and a rare group protest by the paper's reporters calling for theresignation of the official involved, Tuo Zhen, who reportedly had the message edited to singpraises of the Communist Party.

　　The original article titled "China dream, the dream of constitutionalism" had argued that "only byrealising rule by Constitution, effectively checking power, can citizens vocally criticise authority".

　　But the new version by Tuo cut all mention of the need for political reform and asserted that theChinese people are "closer than ever" to their dream of renaissance.

　　"The incident over the New Year greeting has sparked anger among media circles and the publicand has become the worst media scandal in recent years," said the paper's reporters in a petitionlast Friday, demanding that Tuo apologise and resign.

　　In another petition letter yesterday, the paper's editors noted that last year, censors hadchanged or killed 1,034 articles in the weekly, or nearly 20 articles per issue.

　　This comes as the authorities shut down the website of the Beijing-based pro-reform YanhuangChunqiu journal and microblogging accounts of several bloggers.

　　The journal's website editor Zhang Xiao Ou told local media the official reason given was that itfailed to renew its registration. The journal's deputy director Yang Jisheng said it was told by anofficial of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology to shut down the website lastMonday. It was blocked in China from last Friday.

　　Known for its articles on party history and political reform, the journal could have upset theauthorities with its latest commentaries, such as one suggesting that the Chinese Communist Partyshould draw lessons from the corruption case involving former Chongqing party chief Bo Xilai andlimit the power of party secretaries.

　　The censors' actions have sparked an uproar among netizens in China, given the respect enjoyedby both Southern Weekend and Yanhuang Chunqiu.

　　"Are officials not worried about leaving a bad name after they die? Do they really not care aboutnotoriety?" a former Southern Weekendreporter Lin Chufang wrote on his microblog site.

本文关键字: 双语时事