Chinese govt controlled Tibet floods narrative with restricted coverage, censorship: Report

Beijing, Sep 5 (AHN) The Chinese government deployed its usual pattern of restricted coverage, censorship, and emphasising positive news to control the narrative of the Tibet floods, a report has mentioned.

“As a general practice, China’s state media outlets are instructed to emphasise ‘positive reporting’ during times of crisis, while censors remove criticisms of government responses or culpability online,” according to a report in leading online magazine ‘The Diplomat’.

It said that a fight over how the disaster is being reported has been growing in intensity on social media following the devastating floods in Nepal and Tibet.

The dispute is around the claims and counterclaims after a story by Laura Bicker, BBC’s China correspondent, about China censoring videos of the devastation.

“Bicker said videos of the landslide and flood surge sweeping through Gyirong Port on the border were scrubbed from the internet, in part, because Beijing fears instability in the politically sensitive region of Tibet,” the report said.

“As Bicker noted in her report, the most concrete example is the deletion of videos showing the massive wave of mud and water swallowing Gyirong Port. The footage was initially circulated on the platforms Weixin and RedNote, but users later could not access it,” added the Diplomat

It noted that another form of control has been the restricted access for independent and foreign journalists.

“Allyson Horn of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation said she had made repeated requests to travel to Tibet, but was denied. Other foreign journalists have similarly been blocked. This makes it difficult, if not impossible, for foreign media to independently verify the Chinese government’s account of what happened there,” the report emphasised.

It said that the absence of independent reporting, combined with the removal of footage from social media, has allowed the Chinese state media to dominate the narrative.

“This reflects a longstanding tendency in Chinese media to avoid material that could cause social instability or public panic,” the report in The Diplomat stated.

It highlighted that the coverage of the floods in Tibet by the state-controlled media has been focused heavily on the rescue operations of People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Premier Li Qiang’s visit to the disaster zone and President Xi Jinping’s leadership during the crisis.

Efforts to reopen roads and the delivery of disaster-relief supplies to affected residents also received some coverage.

“But as the Guardian has noted, there has been much less reporting about how the disaster has affected local villagers, their homes, and communities. On the Nepali side of the border, meanwhile, foreign journalists have been able to interview survivors without restrictions. Critics also say the Chinese government is hiding the true number of casualties. The problem with these contested claims is that no outsiders – whether they be critics or not – have been able to verify the death toll due to the restricted access to the disaster site,” the Diplomat report noted.

–AHN

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