BEIJING (AP) – China has banned the BBC World News channel in a diplomatic battle with Britain after British regulators revoked the license of China’s state broadcaster CGTN.
Late Thursday’s move was largely symbolic, as BBC World was already limited to being shown on cable TV systems in hotels and apartments for foreigners and other companies.
The National Radio and Television Administration said that China’s BBC World News coverage violated the requirements that news reports be true and impartial and undermine China’s national interests and ethnic solidarity.
The Chinese government has criticized BBC reports for the COVID-19 pandemic in China and allegations of forced labor and sexual abuse in the Xinjiang region, home to Uighurs and other predominantly Muslim ethnic groups.
“The channel does not meet the requirements to broadcast in China as an overseas channel,” the Radio and Television Administration said in a statement dated midnight on Friday.
He gave no indication as to whether BBC reporters in China would be affected.
The communist government in Beijing last year expelled foreign reporters for The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times during disputes with the Trump administration.
British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab, in a written statement, called the measure “an unacceptable restriction on press freedom” that “would only affect China’s reputation in the eyes of the world.”
In Hong Kong, government broadcaster RTHK said it would stop broadcasting BBC World on Friday. He cited the order of the main regulator.
Ofcom, the UK’s communications watchdog, revoked the license for CGTN, China’s English-language satellite news channel, on February 4th. He cited links to the Communist Party of China as one of the reasons.
A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman said Ofcom had acted on “political grounds based on ideological prejudice”.
The loss of the British broadcasting license was an obstacle for the CGTN, which is part of the ruling Communist Party’s efforts to promote its views abroad. CGTN has a European operations center in west London.
U.S. State Department spokesman Ned Price said it was worrying that media operations were restricted in China, while “Beijing leaders use free and open media abroad to promote misinformation.”
Price called on the Chinese government to allow its people free access to the media and the Internet.
“Freedom of the press is an important right and is the key to ensuring an informed citizenry, an informed citizenry that can share its ideas freely with each other and with their leaders,” Price said.