Two Chinese Journalists Detained After Reporting Alleged Local Corruption

Two independent reporters were detained by Chinese authorities after publishing an article that alleged corruption by a local official in southwestern China, the rights group Reporters Without Borders (RSF) said on Tuesday. Chengdu police said they were investigating a 50-year-old man surnamed Liu and a 34-year-old man surnamed Wu on suspicion of making “false accusations” and carrying out “illegal business operations,” and that both had been placed under “criminal coercive measures,” a term commonly used to indicate detention. Media outlets and RSF identified the men as Liu Hu and Wu Yingjiao. The detentions followed an online piece that examined alleged wrongdoing involving Pu Fayou, the Communist Party secretary of Pujiang county in Sichuan, and other county officials; the article has since been removed from the WeChat platform. RSF, headquartered in Paris, condemned the arrests and said the case underscored a growing hostility toward independent reporting in China. “Anyone who dares to investigate malpractice by the Chinese regime is swiftly persecuted by the authorities,” Aleksandra Bielakowska, RSF’s Taipei-based advocacy manager, told AFP. China ranks 178th out of 180 countries on RSF’s press freedom index and is described by the organisation as the world’s “biggest jailer of journalists.” Bielakowska added that under President Xi Jinping information control has tightened to near-totalitarian levels, and independent reporters are often treated as a threat to the state. Liu, an investigative journalist, was previously arrested in 2013 on alleged defamation charges and spent 364 days in detention before being released on bail. Edited by: Elizabeth Schumacher