China’s anti-censorship fight gets big endorsements
Old guard supports free speech
BEIJING – A former secretary to Mao Zedong as well as an ex-publisher of the People’s Daily are among retired Communist Party heavyweights who have published a toughly worded open letter calling on the Chinese government to abolish censorship.
The letter began circulating Oct. 1, but the campaign has gained traction since Friday when the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to dissident writer Liu Xiaobo, imprisoned for his role in drafting a similar pro-democracy letter called Charter 08 two years ago.
This latest call for freedom will not be so easily suppressed because of the Communist Party bona fides of the people who signed.
“These are important people who signed the letter with their names, titles and locations, requesting freedom of expression,” Li Datong, a retired editor from the Communist Youth Daily who is friends with the organizers, said this week. “Clearly, they are not afraid. The trend cannot be stopped.”
Sort of a cross between a chain letter and a petition, this latest missive has been popping up – and then disappearing as it is removed by censors – on various Chinese bulletin boards and blogs over the last few days. It calls for the uncensored circulation of books, newspapers and magazines and the lifting of restrictions on the Internet. It demands the dismantling of the Central Propaganda Department, the powerful body that reports directly to the Politburo and which the letter’s drafters refer to as an “invisible black hand.”
“When our country was founded in 1949, our people cried out that they had been liberated, that they were now their own masters,” the letter states. “But even today, 61 years after the founding of our nation, after 30 years of opening and reform, we have not yet attained the freedom of speech and press to the degree enjoyed by the people of Hong Kong under colonial rule.”
The letter noted that Chinese state media have not even reported on a recent series of remarks made by Premier Wen Jiabao calling for political reform.
The original 23 signatories to the letter included Li Rui, now 93, a former secretary to Mao who was later imprisoned for criticizing his excesses – as well former top officials of People’s Daily, the China Daily and other heavyweight retirees, such as the former curator of the Forbidden City and a former deputy political director of the military from Guangzhou.
More than 400 others have since added their signatures, according to Li Datong, who said, “The numbers would have been in the thousands except that these people are old and not very good at sending the letter over the Internet.”