China responds to US provocation, orders media houses to furnish operational details

Amid rising tension between the US and China, Chinese authorities have ordered several media houses to provide detailed reports about their operations in the country. As per reports, Beijing on Monday, October 26 gave the bureaus of ABC, The Los Angeles Times, Minnesota Public Radio, the Bureau of National Affairs, Newsweek and Feature Story News seven days to disclose information about their staff, finances, operations and real estate in China.

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China responds to US provocation

Chinese government's latest move comes just days after the US Secretary of State announced that six Chinese media houses operating in the United States would have to register as foreign missions which will require the media houses to disclose similar information to the US government as is being requested of the US-based news media.

The recently announced six Chinese media houses that have been ordered by the US to register as foreign missions were the third group to be targeted by the Trump administration. Each time the US government has taken such measures, the Chinese government has retaliated by demanding information from a similar number of news outlets.

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China’s foreign ministry in a statement also admitted that it had taken this recent step "in response to the unreasonable oppression the Chinese media organisations experience in the United States." 

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, in his announcement earlier, had said that Chinese media organisations were owned and controlled by the Chinese government and that the US was attempting to ensure that consumers can "differentiate between news written by a free press and propaganda distributed by the Chinese Communist Party."

Tensions between the US and China have been high for quite some time for several reasons. In response, the Trump administration has begun to apply pressure on China over several aspects like trade, technology, defence and human rights.

(With AP inputs, Image AP)

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