China announced on Wednesday (July 1st) the imposition of reprisals against four American media outlets in the Asian country, after similar measures taken by the United States against Chinese press organs.
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The agency Associated Press (AP) and United Press International (UPI), television CBS and radio NPR must provide within seven days details of their employees, their property and their financial operations in China, said Zhao Lijian, spokesperson for Chinese diplomacy.
These are " much needed reprisals against the unreasonable repression (of the US administration) against Chinese media in the United States, " he said at a regular press conference. The American government modified, on June 22, the status of four Chinese state media, accused of being " propaganda organs " of Beijing and whose offices in the United States are now considered " foreign diplomatic missions "
These media outlets, including public television CCTV and the nationalist tabloid Global Times , must now notify the US State Department of the list of their personnel and their property. This American measure was in addition to an identical decision already taken in February against five other Chinese media.
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At the time, this decision marked the beginning of an escalation in the media between the first two world powers, already grappling with very strong tensions, particularly over the management of the new coronavirus.
In late February, three Wall Street Journal journalists were expelled from China in retaliation for a column in the American daily. This title had been considered racist by Beijing and a number of Chinese. In the process, Washington had sharply reduced the number of Chinese authorized to work for the state media of their country in the United States. Chinese authorities responded by expelling other US correspondents, working for the Wall Street Journal and two other daily newspapers, the New York Times and the Washington Post.
