Zhang Zhan Spreading Disinformation in Wuhan (2020)
Preliminary Step: Read how the West is trying to paint the story, as a human rights abuse. In this case, the example is provided by a clearly racist AFP Report: CHINESE CITIZEN JOURNALIST JAILED FOR WUHAN VIRUS REPORTING . The AFP is one of France's oldest general press agencies, Agence France Press.
Preliminary Step #2: As you read this article you will detect a combative tone alien to Western ears, especially those in the anglophone area, where dissimulation is the establishment's preferred approach to social communication. That said, while the text may sound propagandistic, even strident, pay attention to what it says, for none of the things stated here can be gainsaid. They are all true. Style may matter, but style is not substance. It's also important to remember that Beijing—after years if not decades of a rather benign and passive posture toward regime change NGOs and their native assets in her midst— is finally cracking down on them (as is Russia, to some extent) given the level of demonization manufactured by the US and its Western vassal states against China, and its latest bold attempts at blatant hybrid war in Hong Kong, Tibet and Xinjiang. In this light, Zhang Zhan, along with Joshua Wong and the rest of their ilk, can be seen as a Chinese national openly collaborating with the enemy with potentially grave consequences for the people of China and much of the world.
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CHINESE CITIZEN JOURNALIST JAILED FOR WUHAN VIRUS REPORTING
A Chinese citizen journalist was jailed for four years Monday for her reporting from Wuhan as the Covid-19 outbreak unfurled, her lawyer said, almost a year after details of an “unknown viral pneumonia” surfaced in the central China city.
Zhang Zhan, a former lawyer, was sentenced at a brief hearing in a Shanghai court for allegedly “picking quarrels and provoking trouble” during her reporting in the chaotic initial stages of the outbreak.
Her live reports and essays were shared on social media platforms in February, grabbing the attention of authorities, who have punished eight virus whistleblowers so far as they defang criticism of the government’s response to the outbreak.
Beijing has congratulated itself for “extraordinary” success in controlling the virus inside its borders, with an economy on the rebound while much of the rest of the world stutters through painful lockdowns and surging caseloads a year on from the start of the pandemic in Wuhan.
Controlling the information flow during an unprecedented global health crisis has been pivotal in allowing China’s communist authorities to reframe the narrative in their favour, with President Xi Jinping being garlanded for his leadership by the country’s ruling party.
But that has come at a serious cost to anyone who has picked holes in the official storyline.
The court said Zhang Zhan had spread “false remarks” online, according to one of her lawyers Zhang Keke, but the prosecution did not fully divulge its evidence in court.
“We had no way of understanding what exactly Zhang Zhan was accused of doing,” he added, describing it as “a speedy, rushed hearing.”
In return the defendant “didn’t respond [to questions]… She refused to answer when the judge asked her to confirm her identity.”
The defendant’s mother sobbed loudly as the verdict was read out, Ren Quanniu, another member of Zhang’s defence team, told reporters who were barred from entering the court.
Concerns are mounting over the health of 37-year-old Zhang, who began a hunger strike in June and has been force-fed via a nasal tube.
Her legal team said her health was in decline and she suffered from headaches, dizziness and stomach pain, and that she had appeared in court in a wheelchair.
“She said when I visited her (last week): ‘If they give me a heavy sentence then I will refuse food until the very end.’… She thinks she will die in prison,” Ren said before the trial.
“It’s an extreme method of protesting against this society and this environment.”
China’s communist authorities have a history of putting dissidents on trial in opaque courts between Christmas and New Year in an effort to minimise Western scrutiny.
– Example made –
The sentencing comes just weeks before an international team of World Health Organization experts is expected to arrive in China to investigate the origins of Covid-19.
Zhang was critical of the early response in Wuhan, writing in a February essay that the government “didn’t give people enough information, then simply locked down the city”.
“This is a great violation of human rights,” she wrote.
Rights groups and embassies have also drawn attention to her case, although diplomats from several countries were denied requests to monitor the hearing.
“Zhang Zhan’s case raises serious concerns about media freedom in China,” the British embassy in Beijing said, urging “China to release all those detained for their reporting.”
Authorities “want to use her case as an example to scare off other dissidents from raising questions about the pandemic situation in Wuhan earlier this year”, added Leo Lan, research and advocacy consultant at the Chinese Human Rights Defenders NGO.
Zhang is the first of a group of four citizen journalists detained by authorities after reporting from Wuhan to face trial.
Previous attempts by AFP to contact the other three — Chen Qiushi, Fang Bin and Li Zehua — were unsuccessful.
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Modern France, despite its historical association with Utopian Socialism, is now a fully-fledged member of the ruthless neo-conservative club that marks all the capitalist countries of the West. Indeed, France has been (and remains) one of the most brutal and racially motivated countries Western Europe has ever developed! Even after its shameful defeats during WWI and WWII, and the collapse of its empire around the world, the French military, police and intelligence services continue to inflict casualties around the world – which includes murders and political assassinations – as well as assisting the US in its policy of ‘regime change’ wherever independent thought has developed in the world. Today, the French Constitution embodies Islamophobia as ‘law’ - where Muslim girls and women are forbidden from wearing a headscarf in public. Within Communist China, people of the Islamic faith have complete freedom of worship, dress and association – as would be expected from a civilised country. The institutional racism found in France, however, ensures that the country is now continuously targeted by various disgruntled groups (including ‘White’ Europeans), that resort to ‘terrorist’ activities, etc. The above article penned by the news outlet named ‘AFP’ [Agence France Press] writes on contemporary Chinese issues as if written in the McCarthy-era of Socialist (and racist) persecution in the United States! As a consequence, its anti-China rhetoric is entirely ‘racist’ in motivation, whilst its anti-Communist ideology is purely anti-intellectual in essence.
Beijing Police Protect Zhang Zhan from Crowds Made Angry'By Her Antics.
As matters stand, the Covid19 Crisis has been fully controlled and virtually ‘removed’ as a threat to the population of China, due to the a) actions of the CPC, and b) good and timely behaviour of the Chinese people! The numerous committees that operate throughout China are the foundation of the Communist Party of China. The populace continuously ‘votes’ people onto and off of these committees as they see fit. This process of enhanced ‘democracy’ spreads from the smallest and most remote village to the greatest and most populace cities! Eventually, this process leads to the selection of the General Secretary who is considered the best qualified to administer this extensive democratic mechanism – the biggest the world has ever known! This is how the people of China have taken control of their own destiny, whilst rejecting the corrupt presence of Western imperialism and its predatory capitalism. Since 1949, the Chinese working-class and the peasantry have taken control of China and have transformed it through the expert application of Marxist-Leninist-Maoism which the capitalist West cannot equal or contend with. This is why the Western media must continuously ‘lie’ about everything that happens within China.
Zhang Zhan Arrived at Court in a Wheelchair - but then just walked into the dock.
Despite being treated with kindness, compassion, tolerance and understanding by her fellow Chinese Citizens and the Socialist System, Zhang Zhan strengthened her support for the bourgeois West and its destructive capitalist system. As a lawyer, instead of supporting the people and the CPC – she attempted to change the system into one of discrimination and oppression. She took the side of the US, UK and EU-terrorist attacks in Hong Kong – even attempting a four-day hunger-strike which soon ended when she was shocked by the violence of the protestors! TheCPC and the Chinese people defeated the Covid19 Crisis by carefully isolating and caring for the population – whilst also not scaring the populace through the spreading of false-data, superstition and fear! Unfortunately, Zhang Zhan (whose antics had been tolerated for some time), took to supporting the latter path. This could not be tolerated because of the threat it represented to the health of the nation and the health of the world. Zhang Zhan was therefore arrested, tried and sentenced to four-years in prison – which is a relatively short-time considering her crimes. She will be treated humanely and with compassion and will leave custody a better person.
Demonstrators have been demanding severe punishment for Zhang Zhan.
Zhang Zhan is a ‘Christian’ with links to the Western Churches which support predatory capitalism. Freedom of religion is guaranteed in China – but Zhang Zhan does not want to associate with the indigenous Chinese Churches – but is rather motivated to bring down the Socialist System of China through various acts of low intensity terrorism probably ordered and encouraged by her Western paymasters. It may well be the case that Covid19 did not start in China, or was brought to China by forces antagonistic to the Socialist System. In any case, Zhang Zhan arrived in Wuhan and started making videos uploaded onto the US-controlled YouTube rather than the Chinese-controlled ‘YouKu’. As YouTube is ‘banned’ in China – these videos made by Zhang Zhan were only for Western consumption and had nothing to do with educating the Chinese population – as she alleged during her trial.
Furthermore, the data she was broadcasting was scientifically ‘incorrect’ and liable to cause panic and alarm throughout the world. Of course, anti-Socialist (and racist) Western groups such as ‘Amnesty International’ - which says nothing about the fascism of ‘Donald Trump’ but which continuously criticises Socialist countries from a bourgeois moral perspective – obviously supports people like Zhang Zhan without question!
As a criminal under close arrest, Zhang Zhan was exposed to the occasional judicial use of restraints such as is common-place in the capitalist West! Whilst Amnesty International refers to this legal restraining as ‘torture’ when it is used within the Chinese judicial system – exactly the same methods are declared ‘humane’ by Amnesty International when they are used in the United States (predominately upon Black suspects)! This one example demonstrates the racist hypocrisy used by the West in its reporting of issues happening in China. Zhang Zhan is a common criminal and not a ‘hero’. Her example should not be followed by the youth of the world who are requested to work together within the law to make the world a better place!
Zhang Zhan Opposes Marxism for the Western Christian Churches! This silly woman is not a qualified ‘lawyer’ – but is rather trained in finance and economics! She is the ‘poster boy’ of the moment for the capitalist system and everything ‘anti-intellectual’! —the Author
Zhang Zhan is being supported by the Falun Gong Cult and its newspaper the Epoch Times – as well as its New Tang Dynasty TV Channel! Zhang Zhan might also be linked to the Eastern Lightning Cult – yet another religious aberration supported by US! These are all US government projects designed to create the false front of undermining the peace and tranquillity that exists within Mainland China, and to bring-down the Socialist System.
The criminal Falun Gong cult and its Epoch Times newspaper support Zhang Zhan's criminality.
By implication, Zhang Zhan’s criminality is also supported by the wayward 14th Dalai Lama and his US-fabricated ‘Pro-Tibetan Movement’. These Eurocentric creations function very much like the hideous ‘Black and White Minstrels’ which used to see White people ‘black-up’ and impersonate people of African ethnic heritage. What we have here, is a ‘mimicking’ of Chinese culture by Westerners who know very little about what it means to be ‘ethnically’ Chinese! As long as Zhang Zhan decides to side with the forces of Western racism and crass misrepresentation – she will be considered a ‘criminal’ and treated as such. Zhang Zhan must self-criticise and reform her own character over the four-years the State has granted her for self-observation and reform!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Adrian Chan Wyles is a Member of the Communist Party and an expert in Ancient and Modern Chinese Studies - a Political Commissar (Officer). He is British by birth, lives in London, but his family is Anglo-Chinese, or Sino-English, whichever you prefer. His blog is here. COMMENTS
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Thank you! Very helpful