A popular Chinese blogger known for being critical of the United States has been put in charge of a new China writers’ group believed by some to be a regime propaganda body. The move represents a new attempt by Chinese authorities to promote a vociferously pro-regime voice in the age of the Internet, when the Communist Party has come under unprecedented public pressure for corruption and misgovernance.
Zhou Xiaoping was “elected” to head the newly formed China Online Writers Association in Sichuan Province on June 10 in the group’s first general assembly, which was attended by Communist Party officials from Sichuan’s Propaganda Department, Cultural Bureau, and the provincial state-owned media watchdog, reports nonprofit broadcaster Radio Free Asia (RFA).
Zhou, a slim, bespectacled, black-clad, 34-year-old blogger, rose to fame in October last year when he was publicly praised by Chinese leader Xi Jinping in a conference on art and literature. Xi said Zhou and another conference participant should continue writing articles that carry “positive energy”—official parlance for statements that stick to the Party line.
