Washington: Continuing its clampdown on China’s official media, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo put a cap on the number of Chinese citizens permitted to work for their five official outlets in America at any given time.
Xinhua News Agency, China Radio International, China Global Television Network and China Daily have been asked to reduce their Chinese employees from 160 to 100, a senior State Department official.
They have been asked to comply with the new limits by March 13, the official said.
The cap applies to the five Chinese state media entities operating in the US that have been designated as foreign missions, recognising that they are effectively controlled by the Chinese government, Pompeo said.
”Unlike foreign media organisations in China, these entities are not independent news organisations,” Pompeo said and alleged that for years, the Chinese government has imposed increasingly harsh surveillance, harassment and intimidation against American and other foreign journalists operating in China.
President Donald Trump has made it clear that Beijing’s restrictions on foreign journalists are misguided, he said adding that the US government has long welcomed foreign journalists, including Chinese journalists, to work freely and without threat of reprisal.
”The US government is today instituting a personnel cap on certain PRC-controlled state media entities in the United States specifically, the five entities that were designated by the US State Department on 18 February, 2020, as foreign missions of the People’s Republic of China,” he said.
”This cap limits the number of Chinese citizens permitted to work for these organisations in the United States at any given time,” Pompeo said.
He said that the decision to implement this personnel cap is not based on any content produced by these entities, nor does it place any restrictions on what the designated entities may publish in the United States.
”Our goal is reciprocity. As we have done in other areas of the US-China relationship, we seek to establish a long-overdue level playing field. It is our hope that this action will spur Beijing to adopt a more fair and reciprocal approach to US and other foreign press in China,” he said.
Pompeo urged the Chinese government to immediately uphold its international commitments to respect freedom of expression, including for members of the press.