Embassy ridicules paper’s language

The Chinese Embassy in Spain recently made a stern though humorous announcement, criticizing the European country’s largest newspaper for following certain Western media in hyping the so-called “human rights violations” in China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region.

The announcement commented on a recent report by El Pais about the supposedly leaked documents on China’s Xinjiang policies. The report was so poorly written in Chinese that the Embassy called it “horrible to read” and offered to help the paper improve its writing.

“The translation software of your American friends is not trustworthy sometimes,” the Embassy said.

The embassy also sent a poem written by late Chinese leader Mao Zedong to help improve El Pais’ Chinese level.

The poem tells about tiny flies that make feeble noises in the background of the vast world, and small ants boasting about overturning a big tree. All injurious insects will be wiped out, the poem says.

Mao wrote the poem in 1963 to oppose foreign hegemony.

Recently, the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists that has worked with 17 media partners, including El Pais, received what it said were “official” documents detailing China’s “brainwashing” of Muslims in Xinjiang.

Since November 25, El Pais has released four stories on Xinjiang, accusing of “abuse” of Uyghurs and defaming vocational education and training centers in the region.

No other media in Spain has followed El Pais in slandering China’s Xinjiang policies.

The Chinese Embassy in Spain said in a release on November 27 that the paper’s unexpected publication of news in Chinese was questionable.

“Do you want to use the Chinese story to win the sympathy of Chinese readers and then enter the Chinese market, which you have been longing for?” “Or did certain organizations push you so hard that your newspaper had to cut its proofreading?”

“Regardless, the Embassy is happy to see the efforts you made to learn and use Chinese.”