China - US internet companies under spotlight in censorship row

China’s continued restrictions on internet use has spilled over into political ramifications in recent weeks. With Google recently joining the ever growing internet market in China, the US has forced Chief Executives to explain their bowing to restrictive practices and censorship that have been placed on the companies [Seattle Times]. In the past year Yahoo has been guilty of providing Chinese authorities with names of journalists – both were jailed for ‘subversive activity’. Even the online encyclopaedia Wikipedia has been blocked since October 2005. An article in the Washington Post stated that in December, a message appeared on a Wikipedia page alleging the site had been "conducting anti-China activities under the flag of being neutral" and accusing its senior users of being "running dogs for American imperialism." Some suspected the note was posted by a government agent. This is an ongoing debate which is unlikely to be resolved any time soon. China has a long history of censorship going back many centuries. The first Emperor Qin Shi Huang ordered the burning of books in order to stem the free flow of ideas and maintain his powerbase. Two thousand years on, information flow is once a major issue for China’s leaders. It is a balance between free-trade and free-speech, and many companies are taking a pragmatic approach as well as a practical one. China maintain that their attitude to the internet was positive [Xinhua]. But Liu Zhengrong, deputy director general of Internet Affairs Bureau of the State Council Information Office, speaking to the Press on 14th of February in Beijing, said, “China regulates the Internet according to law and has accordingly enacted relevant rules and regulations.”