Legal News
November 2009
- China has appealed against a ruling by a World Trade Organisation panel that deemed the Mainland’s regulations on the import and distribution of publications and audio-visual products to not adhere to world trade rules. This is the latest episode in an ongoing case originally brought to the attention of the WTO by the US in 2007, when it was alleged that China had not provided enough access for imports of books, newspapers, DVDs, CDs, games and the like. A WTO expert panel issued a ruling in August this year that mostly upheld the allegations and called on China to change its import regulations. However, the Ministry of Commerce disagreed with the ruling, saying that China has fulfilled its obligations on market access for publications and audio-visual products. The WTO’s appellate body has up to three months to review the China-US dispute and decide whether or not to change the panel’s ruling.
- Reporters will gain greater protection in China after its law on the administration of press cards was amended. The new measures went into effect on 15 October, according to an order published on the General Administration of Press and Publication’s (GAPP) website. Journalists who receive press cards are legally protected and governments at all levels must ensure they are allowed to fulfill their reporting duties, according to the new measures. Interference or hindrance by organisations or individuals of journalists’ legal reporting activity will not be allowed, the new law says. In recent years, reporters’ personal safety and rights have often been challenged, said Cong Chunhua, the director of the school of communication studies of Fujian Normal University. The new laws also state that journalists should not write false reports or conduct business operations, such as for advertising or the distribution of newspapers.
- A former chief justice has been arrested for allegedly providing protection to gangsters. Wen Qiang, who was previously the head of Chongqing Municipality’s judicial administration bureau and the deputy chief of police, is the biggest catch in a crackdown on organised crime in the municipality. Since June, more than 1500 people have been arrested, including 67 gang bosses, three billionaires and 50 government officials. Wen was arrested in at Chongqing Airport after returning from Beijing where he had attended a meeting of justice officials. He is also suspected of being involved in rape, money laundering, disguising or concealing the proceeds of crime, illegally holding firearms, offering loans at high interest, forging official and enterprise seals, prostitution and taking bribes. He is reported to have amassed a fortune of more than one billion yuan in property and cash. Wen’s accomplice, Peng Changjian, the deputy chief of Chongqing’s public security bureau, died in detention of a heart attack in September. He allegedly took 820,000 yuan and HK$100,000 in bribes and offered assistance to illegal business operations.
- A Shanghai-based writer was prevented from entering China in Shenzhen in October. Li Jianhong, a member of the Independent Chinese PEN Centre (ICPC) which advocates for the rights of Chinese-language writers, was sent back by Chinese authorities to Hong Kong where she had arrived from Sweden. Earlier this year, she had applied to extend her Chinese passport while in Stockholm City, Sweden, where she had been the ‘Writer of Residence’, but the Chinese Embassy there rejected her application. The passport was due to expire in late October. In order to return to China with a valid passport, she went to Hong Kong in early October and had planned to return to Shanghai later. Li is currently the ICPC’s documentation secretary and a member of the organisation’s Writers in Prison Committee and its Networking Working Committee. In 2002, she co-founded the independent Chinese website ‘Enlightenment Forum’, which was shut down two years later by Chinese authorities.
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