中国紙記者スト 言論は統制強化で抑え込めぬ

The Yomiuri Shimbun (Jan. 14, 2013)
China should relax government control of media
中国紙記者スト　言論は統制強化で抑え込めぬ（1月13日付・読売社説）

It has become clear that China's new leadership headed by Xi Jinping intends to tighten government control over Chinese media.
　中国メディアに対する統制を強化する習近平政権の姿勢が鮮明になったといえよう。

The New Year's editorial of the Southern Weekend, a weekly newspaper in Guangdong Province that is highly popular for its aggressive investigative reporting of corruption and other irregularities, was replaced at the order of the propaganda department of the Communist Party Committee of the province. The editorial writers of the Southern Weekend, also known as the Southern Weekly, went on strike to protest the action.
　腐敗追及などの調査報道で人気のある中国広東省の週刊紙「南方週末」の新年社説が、お目付け役である省共産党委員会宣伝部の指示で書き換えられ、これに抗議する記者たちがストを起こした。

Management of the Southern Weekend and the editorial writers subsequently held negotiations over the matter, with the province's Communist Party Committee acting as arbitrator.
The issue was settled with the editorial writers agreeing to stop the walkout and the weekly's management agreeing not to punish them. It could be inferred that the way the problem was settled represented a concession on the part of the Xi administration, which is wary about expansion of democracy movements.
　南方週末の経営陣と記者側が省党委員会の調停で事態収拾へ協議した結果、記者たちはストを中止し、経営陣は記者の責任を問わないことで決着した。民主化運動の拡大を警戒する習政権がひとまず譲歩したとみてよい。

However, on the heels of the incident, the Communist Party's Central Propaganda Department instructed media across the country to republish an editorial of the party's mouthpiece People's Daily that warned that any media that publicly criticized the government would be "certainly defeated."
　だが事件後、党中央宣伝部は、メディアが政府に公然と対抗すれば「必ず敗れる」と警告する党機関紙・人民日報系紙の社説を転載するよう各新聞社に指示した。

===

Action counters Constitution

The Chinese government probably considered it essential to toughen its control over the freedom of speech in order to maintain the Communist Party's dictatorial rule.
　一党独裁を維持していく上で、むしろ言論統制は強める必要があると考えているからだろう。

The weekly's editorial that instigated the latest incident was titled "China's Dream, the Dream of Constitutionalism" and published on Jan. 3.
　今回、当局が検閲で問題視したのは、「中国の夢、憲政の夢」と題する３日付の南方週末の社説だ。

The editorial urged Chinese leaders to uphold the importance of steering the government democratically based on China's Constitution. The party must have regarded the editorial as tantamount to rejecting the Communist Party's dictatorship, and the weekly was ordered to replace it with another.
憲法に基づく民主的な政治の重要性を訴えた内容が、共産党独裁を否定するものと受け止めて、差し替えさせた。

China's Constitution guarantees freedom of speech. The reality, however, is that the party's propaganda department has the power to reassign media personnel, a power it wields extrajudicially.
　中国憲法は「言論の自由」を保障している。しかし、メディアの人事権を握る党宣伝部が超法規的な存在としてにらみを利かせているのが実態である。

Interference in the content of articles has become an everyday event, but open challenges to the authority of the propaganda department are extremely rare.
　記事への介入は日常茶飯事だが、今回のように記者が統制に反発し、宣伝部と激しく対立したのは極めて異例だ。

In this case, maybe the editorial writers were testing the attitude of the newly inaugurated Xi administration toward the media.
記者の行動には、発足直後の習政権の出方をうかがう意図もあったのだろう。

When the incident was reported on the Internet, more than 150 former media employees posted protest letters online, and human rights activists and scholars released protest statements one after another.
　事件がインターネットで伝わると、元記者ら１５０人以上が連名で抗議書簡をネットに公開したほか、人権活動家や学者らも抗議声明を出す事態に発展した。

===

Accept changes in society

An influential newspaper in Beijing also resisted the propaganda department, temporarily refusing to republish the editorial of the People's Daily.
北京の有力紙も宣伝部に抵抗し、警告社説の転載を一時拒否した。

Given that the number of people using the Internet in China has surpassed 500 million, it must already be very hard for Beijing to suppress voices calling for the freedom of speech by means of conventional iron-fisted oppression.
　ネット人口が５億人を超えた中国で、言論の自由拡大を求める声を従来の強権的手法で抑え込むのはもはや難しいのではないか。

Meanwhile, income disparities in China have become increasingly egregious, and dissatisfaction among ordinary people has neared a breaking point.
　中国の所得格差は深刻で、民衆の不満は極限まで膨らんでいる。

Apart from this problem, easing media control is indispensable to clamping down on corruption by high-ranking party officials.
幹部の汚職摘発を進めるためにも報道統制の緩和は欠かせない。

The United States has expressed its concern over the Chinese authorities' censorship of the Southern Weekend.
　南方週末に対する中国当局の検閲には、米政府が懸念を示した。

The Xi administration should be aware that the suppression of freedom of speech has marred China's image as the world's second-largest economic powerhouse.
習政権は、言論弾圧が世界第２位の経済大国のイメージを損なっていることを自覚すべきである。

If the Chinese authorities want social stability, they must respond sincerely to the rapid diversification in society that comes with the globalization of the economy.
　中国当局が安定を求めるなら、経済のグローバル化に伴い価値観が多様化してきた社会の変化を、真摯(しんし)に受け止めねばならない。

(From The Yomiuri Shimbun, Jan. 13, 2013)
（2013年1月13日01時41分  読売新聞）