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Beijing Olympics Brings Big Trouble to Chinese Regime

Melamine scandal and other troubles pile up
By D.J. McGuire Nov 14, 2008


WORLDWIDE SCANDAL: Thai officials fill snacks and food products tainted with the toxic chemical melamine in a container prior to destruction in the provincial capital of Ayutthaya. (Pornchai Kittiwongsakul/AFP/Getty Images)

Over the weekend, we discovered once and for all what a disaster the 2008 Beijing Olympics really were for the Communist regime. The reason, however, was not an expected one. The Washington Post, in its analysis of the melamine poison scandal, unearthed the surprising fact that essentially wiped out all the benefits of the summer propaganda exercise (emphasis added):

“Initially covered up by officials afraid of losing their jobs and besmirching the Beijing Olympic Games, the melamine contamination scandal began with infant milk formula that killed at least four infants and sickened 54,000 babies. It soon spread to candy, instant coffee, yogurt, biscuits and other products made with Chinese milk, prompting bans or recalls in 16 countries.

“In recent weeks the toxin has been discovered in eggs and in animal feed, sparking fears that tainted foods go well beyond dairy products and may include fish, shrimp, beef and poultry.”

So it turns out that fear of "besmirching the Beijing Olympic Games" led in part to the greatest international embarrassment for the Chinese Communist Party in nineteen years.

Oops.

Under normal circumstances, this would be bad enough, but the regime is going through anything but normal times.

For starters, we have the oncoming recession, the first serious one since the regime become the export maven for which it was famous just months ago (and is now infamous, see above).

The extent of the economic slowdown is becoming unavoidable; the coal and coke industry appear to be in a full-fledged recession—a word that strikes terror in the heart of a regime that needs economic growth of at least 7 percent just to keep up with the population.

It might also explain the impetus behind the massive "economic stimulus" the cadres announced over the weekend, although the success of that plan is debatable, at best. More likely, it will simply mean more incentives for the cadres to steal land and build useless factories while the economy sinks beneath the waves and the ecology worsens.

The melamine and economic crises also come just as the rest of the world has decided to stop giving the Communists so much slack over festering problems that refuse to simply go away. The regime's insistence that the "developed world" cover the cost of greenhouse-gas reduction rings quite hollow now that Communist China is the leading carbon emitter.

True, Taiwan is becoming much more cooperative under President Ma Ying-jeou, and the fate of former president and advocate of Taiwan independence Chen Shui-bian, who was arrested Wednesday morning, is letting Beijing enjoy some Taiwanese schadenfreude. But even that is countered by the Dalai Lama’s decision to would listen more to his people and take a tougher line on occupied Tibet.

Even worse for the cadres, India's center-left government appears to have finally gotten wise about the real danger from Beijing. With the right-wing opposition already suspicious of the Communist regime, anti-Communism in India has become the consensus position—a serious geopolitical problem for a regime dependent upon foreign appeasement to advance, or even survive.

The cadres will do their best to ignore all of this, and choose instead to go with the tried but not longer so true formula. They will continue expanding their influence abroad. They will continue to crush dissent at home. They will continue to use the Korean colony to maximum effect—although with trouble with the abductions of Japanese citizens returning to the news, that could rapidly see diminishing returns.

Those who remember the First Cold War will remember this phase of Communism well: the Brezhnev phase.

Leonid Brezhnev's solution for the problems faced by the Soviet Union—ignore them and increase the aggressive behavior abroad—worked so well that the USSR couldn't outlast him by as much as a decade, even though no American President seriously challenged his regime until just before he died.

That should bring hope to all anti-Communists. Even if Obama becomes the "second Carter" his critics fear he will be, Hu Jintao seems determined to be the second Brezhnev.

Bismark is reported to have said, "God has a special providence for fools, drunks, and the United States of America." He continues to be more right than he could have possibly imagined.

D.J. McGuire is co-founder of the China e-Lobby and the author of Dragon in the Dark: How and Why Communist China Helps Our Enemies in the War on Terror .
Last Updated
Nov 14, 2008

17.11.08 07:12, comment

Eutelsat would be technically capable of restoring NTDTV’s broadcasts to Asia today

Reporters Without Borders has written to Giuliano Berretta, the head of the French satellite company Eutelsat, urging him to resume transmission of the Chinese-language television station NTDTV on his W5 satellite and thereby respect the principles of equal access, pluralism and non-discrimination enshrined in article 3 of the convention that governs Eutelsat’s operations.

Eutelsat’s W5 satellite stopped carrying the Asia broadcasts of NTDTV and three Mandarin radio stations, including Sound of Hope, after reporting a technical incident on 16 June.

The Chinese government has often criticised NTDTV’s programmes about the human rights situation in China and there are grounds for suspecting that Eutelsat’s suspension of its broadcasts is not due solely to a technical problem.

In addition to the statements of a Eutelsat employee in China confirming that the Chinese government had been pressuring the company, Reporters Without Borders has obtained new information indicating that Eutelsat would be technically capable of restoring NTDTV’s broadcasts to Asia today, thereby ending a crisis that has damaged Eutelsat’s credibility.

“One of your clients, the Broadcasting Board of Governors (BBG), which handles the broadcasts of Radio Free Asia and Voice of America, has just withdrawn from W5,” the letter says. “This therefore leaves sufficient capacity on one of the transponders, C2, for restoring NTDTV. In fact, in July, BBG was using your satellite to broadcast five TV stations and 12 radio stations to Asia.”

A BBG spokesperson has confirmed to Reporters Without Borders that none of their broadcasts have been carried by this Eutelsat satellite since 1 August. So how, when room has been freed up on one of W5’s transponders, can Eutelsat continue to insist that it is impossible to resume broadcasting of NTDTV?

Eutelsat claims that four of the satellite’s transponders, including C4 and C6, had to be turned off to allow the other 20 to keep going. But Reporters Without Borders has learned that the C6 transponder has been used again for transmission, although reports about the 16 June incident by Eutelsat-Thales Alenia Space (the satellite’s constructor) said this would not be possible.

NTDTV representatives always get the same answer from Eutelsat: “We cannot resume broadcasting for technical reasons. Contact our competitors.” A Eutelsat release on 11 July said that, because of the 16 June incident, it would not be possible to get the four transponders running again.

Why is Eutelsat refusing to broadcast NTDTV and three radio stations although some of the transponders that were turned off in June have again been used?

“With the Olympic Games taking place in China, it is vital that Chinese TV viewers should have the possibility of accessing independent news and information,” the letter adds. “We therefore urge you now to take the necessary measures so that NTDTV broadcasts are again transmitted by the W5 satellite. The many protests by the station’s viewers demonstrate its utility and importance", concluded Reporters Without Borders in its letter addressed to Giuliano Berretta.

www.rsf.org

19.8.08 05:17, comment

European satellite operator Eutelsat suppresses independent Chinese-language TV station NTDTV to sat

Previously unpublished conversation by Eutelsat employee confirms move was politically motivated

rsf
Reporters Without Borders calls on Giuliano Berretta, the CEO of the European satellite company Eutelsat, to quickly reverse its decision to suspend independent Chinese-language broadcaster NTDTV’s use of Eutelsat’s W5 satellite to broadcast to Asia.

Eutelsat claims it was forced to suspend NTDTV (New Tang Dynasty Television) on 16 June because of a technical problem but a recorded conversation with an employee of Eutelsat show it was a premeditated, politically-motivated decision violating the free flow of information and the convention under which Eutelsat operates.

“The real reason for the decision to suppress NTDTV exposes how Eutelsat operates in China,” the press freedom organisation said. “The company’s credibility is at stake and we urge its shareholders to intervene as quickly as possible so that NTDTV can resume broadcasting on this satellite. If that is not done, none of the TV companies that are Eutelsat clients will ever be sure they could not also be arbitrarily disconnected one day because of their content.”

Reporters Without Borders added: “NTDTV’s broadcasts irked the Chinese government because, thanks to this satellite, they could be freely received in tens of millions of Chinese homes. Their suspension just a few weeks ahead of the Olympic Games looks like a favour provided by Eutelsat with the aim of obtaining new deals. Eutelsat tried to drop NTDTV once before, in 2005, but an international campaign forced it to sign a new long term contract.”

In a recorded conversation on 23 June with an interlocutor the employee thought was a Chinese Propaganda Department official, a Eutelsat representative in Beijing said:

“It was our company’s CEO in France who decided to stop NTDTV’s signal. (...)We could have turned off any of the transponders. (...) It was because we got repeated complaints and reminder from the Chinese government. (...) Two years ago, the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television kept saying the same thing over and over: ‘Stop that TV station before we begin to talk.’

Reporters Without Borders is posting a transcript of this conversation on its website (www.rsf.org) and it has an audio recording that is available to the media.

A New York-based TV station with links to the Falun Gong spiritual movement, NTDTV began broadcasting in Chinese four years ago. Its programmes are very different from the content on China’s state TV stations. There is a great deal of coverage of human rights issues, including the repression in Tibet and of religious groups such as Falungong and the underground Christian churches.

The day after it stopped transmitting NTDTV, Eutelsat issued a statement saying the W5 satellite has suffered serious technical problems that had forced the company to reduce the number of transponders and stop broadcasting several TV stations.

Eutelsat and Thales, the French company that made the satellite, are doing more and more business in China. It was Thales that manufactured Zhongxing-9, the satellite that was put in orbit last month to guarantee good coverage of the Olympic Games. Eutelsat has signed a contract with China to use its Long March rocket to launch Eutelsat satellites. The Wall Street Journal wrote in April: “Eutelsat for years has been trying to find a way to penetrate the Chinese market, and launch contracts are widely seen as one way to help reach that goal.”

As a company headquartered in France, Eutelsat is nonetheless obliged to respect the principles of equality of access, pluralism and non-discrimination enshrined in article 3 of a convention governing the operations of satellite companies.

Ever since NTDTV was launched in February 2002, the Chinese government has been trying to get its broadcasts suppressed by pressuring satellite operators and governments.

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Transcript Eutelsat

1 Comment 11.7.08 04:49, comment

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