Anger, disbelief at Chinese journalists’ expulsion

BEIJING: The news of India expelling three journalists of China’s official news agency Xinhua was greeted here with a mix of anger, disbelief and disappointment.

State-controlled Chinese media is yet to carry the report of the unprecedented expulsion but reports from Indian media — in which Indian authorities accused the three of going beyond the brief of journalism — have been circulated on online forums and on the Twitter-like Weibo platforms.

HT broke the story on July 23 that three journalists — Wu Qiang, Tang Lu and She Yonggang — from New Delhi and Mumbai were told by authorities to pack up and leave the country by July 31. Though no official reason was given for the directive, anonymous officials later said the three were suspected of doing “un-journalistic work”.

Expressing shock, Chinese journalists said it was India’s insecurity and notion of conspiracy at China’s so-called role in blocking New Delhi’s bid for the Nuclear Suppliers Group at work. Top Chinese experts on Sino-Indian relations, meanwhile, said India’s decision to send off the journalists without clear and substantiated reasons will impact bilateral ties.

They were apprehensive that a chill could spread over India-China ties in a year when PM Narendra Modi is expected to visit China in September for the G20 summit and later President Xi Jinping is scheduled to be in Goa in October for the BRICS meeting. Repeated requests to the ministry of foreign affairs and the Xinhua news agency for a reaction till late on Sunday evening went unheeded.

“It was a very sad and very bad news,” Hu Shisheng, a South Asia expert at the government-affiliated China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations, said, adding: “I do not see any logic or reason behind it.” “The outcome might not be good. The journalists were well known in the circles of South Asian and Indian experts. One of them, Tang Lu, has been studying India for more than 20 years,” Long Xingchun, director of Centre for India Studies at the China West Normal University, said.