Several Chinese reporters participating in the news conference got their articles confiscated, including some notebooks and a mini recorder. Also, the news of this murder was scarcely mentioned or not at all by Chinese websites. This underlines the intention of the Chinese Communist regime to obliterate the incident from the record of these Olympics, so as not to tarnish the image of Beijing 2008.
The fact that Chinese reporters’ notebooks and a recorder were confiscated is a concern for many people. Even though for Chinese reporters, getting some personal items confiscated is not unusual, this is the first time it has happened during the Olympics.
Chinese reporters were interrogated after talking with American male volleyball team members about the murder. The Beijing Olympics organizing committee claimed they wanted to know what the American volleyball team had said, because they didn’t fully understand the news conference, as all conversations were in English.
The International Federation of Journalists accused the Chinese Communist regime of secretly tailing news reporters. Last Saturday, when journalists from The Thames shot pictures of the murderer after he jumped off a building and killed himself, they noticed some unidentified people photographing them. Another foreign reporter, after interviewing a French athlete in the airport, saw two plainclothes men taking pictures of him.
Many Chinese websites initially published the murder news, but subsequently removed it. The Chinese regime’s media mouthpiece, Xinhua, first downplayed the murder as an “isolated case of extreme behavior” and then withdrew the article.
