The U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is reviewing complaints seeking to punish the Communist Party’s China Global Television Network (CGTN), an overseas subsidiary of China Central Television (CCTV), for inaccurate reporting that forced CGTN to quit the U.K. network and incur large fines.
An FCC spokeswoman said Monday (March 22) that the agency is reviewing a complaint from the Spain-based private organization Safeguard Defenders centered on individuals of foreign nationality who were forced to confess guilt and make false statements while detained in China on CGTN. The organization said Beijing then used the complaints to make false statements and coerced misrepresentations.
Beijing then used the foreigners’ appearances as propaganda for broadcast around the world, including in the United States, the group said.
In a 32-page complaint filed with the FCC, the group publicly asked the FCC to investigate CGTN and also asked for punishment for CGTN’s actions.
The complaint against CGTN names Yu Yingzeng, a Chinese-American, and her husband, British detective Peter Humphrey, who were hired to investigate whistleblowers for bribes paid by GlaxoSmithKline in China and were subsequently sentenced to nearly two years in prison by Communist authorities for illegally obtaining citizen information. They deny the charge.
Han Feilong complained to Ofcom in November 2018 that two programs broadcast by CGTN News about him were unfair or inequitable treatment of him, as well as an unwarranted invasion of his privacy.
He said the CGTN broadcast of the guilty plea was recorded under duress and that he was drugged, placed in a confinement cell and forced to read from a guilty plea script.
An FCC spokesman declined to comment on the complaint, and CGTN officials declined to be interviewed.
Countries Wary of Communist Propaganda Machine Export
The growing presence of Communist state-run media in Western countries in recent years has raised concerns among foreign governments that Beijing is trying to influence public opinion outside of China, but that nearly all content produced by foreign media is being blocked from China’s domestic print, broadcast and online platforms.
The U.S. and some other Western governments have taken steps to limit the influence of Communist Party-controlled media outlets, and social media outlets such as Twitter have begun labeling that they (their accounts) belong to Chinese (Communist Party) media.
The Trump administration classified the CCP’s CCTV as a foreign mission, similar to a consulate, and limited the number of CCP media employees, including CCTV, working in the U.S.; the CCP subsequently retaliated by canceling the visas of some U.S. journalists in China.
FCC Acting Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel said in a speech last week that the FCC is addressing a number of China-related challenges, including plans to weed out equipment from Chinese manufacturers such as huawei Technologies Co. from the U.S. telephone network and to address Communist Party state-sponsored cyber theft.
She also mentioned that the FCC is taking steps to restrict services offered by Chinese telecom operators in the U.S., though television was not part of her remarks last week.
Regulators in several countries have received similar complaints against CGTN
Ofcom also ordered CGTN to pay a £225,000 fine for broadcasting false admissions of guilt and inaccurate coverage of protests in Hong Kong, after confirming in February that CGTN holders were not independent of Beijing’s control.
“Similar lawsuits have been filed by Safeguard in Canada and Australia, where broadcasting authorities are reviewing complaints against CGTN, and an Australian public television network recently said it would stop broadcasting some of CGTN’s programs.
According to the complaint released Monday, dozens of CGTN broadcasts in the United States between 2013 and 2019 – including forced confessions – violated a U.S. directive that broadcasters not “intentionally distort the news “It also violates the FCC’s position that “manipulation or distortion of news reporting is the most egregious and contrary to the public interest.”
“Safeguard said the organization initially filed a complaint with the FCC in late 2019, but has not yet received a response.
“In an era of constant disinformation by state-sponsored actors, especially when they are hostile to the United States, regulatory agencies like the FCC have a legal and moral responsibility to investigate such violations.” According to an open letter from Peter Dahlin, a director of Safeguard, who has himself been convicted in China.
The FCC’s Web site says the First Amendment limits its ability to interfere with a broadcaster’s choice of news or commentary, but when it receives documentary evidence, such as from “individuals with first-hand, direct information,” it will investigate to prove that the news was intentionally falsified.
However, legal sources believe that the U.S. has less power to monitor broadcast content than the U.K. and that sanctions are unlikely. Francisco Montero, a partner at Arlington, Virginia-based law firm Fletcher, Heald & Hildreth, told the Wall Street Journal that while the FCC has an obligation to review to avoid airing information it knows is false, the FCC’s view is that it is not involved in content regulation.
CCTV produces programming in English, Chinese and other languages, potentially reaching more than 90 million U.S. households, according to 2016 data from Sarah Cook, an analyst at Washington-based Freedom House.
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