AUSTRALIA: TV Network Denies Censor Role in China

By Stephen de Tarczynski

MELBOURNE, Aug 6 (IPS) - An electronic paper trail indicates that one of Australia’s leading television networks may be involved in dissuading foreign media in China against covering "forbidden" topics.

The contents of an e-mail sent in March of this year by the chief operating officer of the Beijing Media Centre (BMC) to Australian television’s Special Broadcasting Service (SBS) -- revealed recently by SBS’s Dateline programme -- appears to show that BMC explicitly warned foreign journalists not to report on sensitive topics.

"As I’m sure that you are aware, there are guidelines that have been put in place for international media coming to Beijing/China in 2008 and there are politically sensitive topics that the Government has asked the foreign media not to cover," says the e-mail’s author, whose identity is yet to be confirmed, but who is being reported in Australian media to be BMC’s current chief operating officer, Gavin Romanis.

BMC is a joint-venture between Australia’s Seven Network Australia -- one of Australia’s leading media companies and this country’s largest commercial television network --and the Beijing City government.

The Seven Network was well-positioned to enter into the joint venture given that the company’s chairman, Kerry Stokes, has been involved in operations in China since the 1990s.

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