Chang Ping, Yaxue Cao, February 28, 2021 (continued from Part One, Part Two, Part Three, and Part Four) Under attack in 2008 for a FT column on Tibet In 2005 I returned to Guangzhou and founded Southern Metropolis Weekly (《南都周刊》). In those years China saw the emergence of civil rights activities and NGOs, and new ideas thrived. Several publications under the Southern Press Group were very into these new developments, and Southern Metropolis Weekly’s reportage stood out in this area, even though the magazine’s initial focus was urban life and culture. As the editor-in-chief of the Weekly, as well as a columnist for Southern Weekend and Southern Metropolis Daily, I made a conscious effort to speak to readers about the concept of civil society. And […]

By China Change, published: February 25, 2016 Retired Chinese real estate mogul Ren Zhiqiang (任志强), known as “Cannon Ren,” fired at Xi Jinping after Xi’s tour of China Central Television. Xi Dada’s opinion warriors are now all over him, outdoing one another to see who can work themselves into the biggest frenzy.  – The Editors     The first article in the attack against Ren Zhiqiang, “Why Must Netizens Teach Ren Zhiqiang Lessons About the Party?”, appeared on Qianlong.com, a website sponsored by the propaganda department of the Beijing Party Committee. Then it was republished on the website of the Office of the Central Leading Group for Cyberspace Affairs and the Cyberspace Administration of China. The author, Li Jiming (李吉明), is a member of the Party and […]

By Matthew Robertson and Yaxue Cao, published: July 27, 2015   On the heels of a nationally coordinated campaign of arrests and disappearances of rights lawyers in China, Party-run media have aggressively attacked, framed, and sought to defame the same lawyers in articles and news reports (here, here, and here). In one CCTV segment in particular, Wang Yu (王宇), one of China’s most prominent rights defenders, was portrayed as a menace to court order as she loudly remonstrated with bailiffs. Wang was, along with four other lawyers, attempting to defend three practitioners of Falun Gong, a spiritual practice that is heavily persecuted in China, in a court in Shenyang, Liaoning Province last April. On July 19, nine days after Wang Yu had been taken away […]