Detained reporter apologizes for releasing untrue stories

[BalanceOfPower]

Detained reporter apologizes for releasing untrue stories

Xinhua | 2013-10-26 11:39:41
By Agencies

A Chinese reporter who is now detained confessed his acts of having released unverified and untrue stories about a company for money and fame and expressed his apology, Xinhua has learned.

Chen Yongzhou, a journalist with the New Express based in the southern city of Guangzhou, said to police that he had continuously released a series of unverified and false reports against the giant engineering company Zoomlion at the request of others.

At the request of others, Chen fabricated facts and wrote more than 10 reports based on supplied materials from Sept. 29, 2012 to Aug. 8, 2013 about Zoomlion's "financial problems" without verification, bringing huge losses to the company and its share prices, police said late Friday.

The fabricated problems, including loss of state assets, ugly marketing, sales and financial fraud, were groundless and out of Chen's subjective assumption, according to police. The reports were widely forwarded over the Internet, causing severe social impact.

He would like to apologize to the Zoomlion, the stock investors and his own family members, and warn his peers to "learn a lesson from myself," he was quoted by police as saying.

Chen was caught on Oct. 18 in Guangzhou by police from Changsha, capital of central China's Hunan Province where Zoomlion is based, and detained on suspicion of damaging business reputation.

According to the Changsha City Public Security Bureau, they received complaints from Zoomlion about Chen's series of false reports on Sept. 9, and after investigation, detained him with the help of police in Guangzhou.

Chen, 27, has served for the New Express as a reporter since graduation in 2009.

Police said the newspaper released a story under Chen's name around mid-May 2003 on Zoomlion's advertising fee, claiming the annual amount reached 513 million yuan (84.34 million US dollars) and irregular mareketing practices were involved. The story, written at the request of a middleman, caused quite a stir.

Zoomlion later issued a clarification statement, citing audit reports to say the mentioned amount also included the company's travel expenses and marketing fee in 2012, while the advertising fee only accounted for 20 percent of the total.

Local police said Chen ignored the audit reports of two accounting firms and published an article on the New Express on May 27, accusing the company's central China sales area of filing false sales and financial statements.

The article resulted in very bad impact on Zoomlion. The Zoomlion share in Shenzhen was forced to be suspended for two days, arousing industry regulators, shareholders, celebrities and investors to query and criticize the company's sectors of finance, management and sales.

Zoomlion had to publish a clarification announcement .

According to judicial accounting, the company's market value in Shenzhen and Hong Kong dropped by 1.37 billion yuan on May 29, leading to great losses for the stock investors.

Chen confessed to the police that he was "afraid of getting into trouble" after he saw such severe consequences he had caused.

According to police, Chen received "rewards" provided by other people ranging from thousands of yuan to tens of thousands of yuan during this period.

In June and July 2013, Chen was arranged by other people to visit industry regulators in Beijing and Hong Kong, blowing the whistle on Zoomlion using his real name.

The China Securities Regulatory Commission said in a written reply that after checking and investigation, they found no evidence of Zoomlion's central China sales area having made false sales and financial statements, nor did they find conflicting data.

The middleman, believing negative impact had been made and expectations met, gave hundreds of thousands of yuan and thousands of Hong Kong dollars as "reward" to Chen several times, said the police.

Chen confessed that only "one and a half" of his more than 10 reports about Zoomlion were done after gathering information himself, while the rest were made based on provided articles. He even published some of the supplied articles on the New Express without reading them first.

"I did not check the content of these articles and only made minor changes. I used some vague words so that I and the New Express would not be targeted," Chen said to the local police.

Chen said that he knew these reports would damage the reputation of Zoomlion, but did not expect the impact would be that big.

"If I were given a chance to be a reporter again, I would follow the professional ethics to write impartial, true, objective and balanced reports. I would not be lured by benefits," Chen said to the police.

The case is under further investigation.

 

[BalanceOfPower]

Chinese journalist 'confesses' to accepting bribes

Chen Yongzhou, the detained New Express reporter at centre of campaign, appears on state TV to "confess" to crimes

Journalist Chen as he gives his confession in a detention room at the Changsha Public Security Bureau detention centre in Changsha City, Hunan Province Photo: REUTERS

By Malcolm Moore
10:00AM BST 26 Oct 2013

A Chinese reporter whose newspaper fought back after he was lured to a police station and then arrested for alleged libel has become the latest high profile detainee to be paraded on state television.

Chen Yongzhou, 27, appeared in a nine minute-long broadcast on China Central Television to "confess" to having been paid to put his byline to articles accusing Zoomlion, a Chinese heavy machinery manufacturer, of fraud.

Last week, Mr Chen's newspaper, the New Express, took the unprecedented step of publishing two large front-page articles calling for the authorities to release him.

His case quickly won public sympathy, after it emerged that police from Zoomlion's home city, Changsha, had travelled 440 miles to arrest him in another province.

After Mr Chen's wife revealed the numberplate of the car used by the police to drive her husband into detention, it was claimed that the vehicle belonged to Zoomlion.

The father of Zoomlion's chief executive, Zhan Chunxin, was once head of the supreme court in Hunan province. His father-in-law, meanwhile, used to be the province's deputy party secretary.

Mr Chen, who appeared in handcuffs, said on the CCTV broadcast that he did not write the articles himself. "I am willing to confess and repent my crimes, and I would like to apologise to Zoomlion, its shareholders, the media groups whose credibility suffered [because of me] and my family."

"I did this mainly because I hankered after money and fame. I've been used. I have realised my wrongdoing."

According to CCTV, an unnamed third party paid Mr Chen to write the articles about Zoomlion. He admitted on air that on one occasion he did not "take a single look" at the report that was to be published under his name.

Mr Chen is the latest victim of what appears to be a disturbing new trend: to elicit public confessions from high-profile detainees before charges are filed against them.

Peter Humphrey, a British corporate investigator, and Charles Xue, an internet entrepreneur, were also both paraded on state television earlier this year.

Zhu Xuedong, a magazine editor in Beijing, wrote on Sina Weibo, China's version of Twitter, that the tactic reminded him of the "criticism and attack sessions" held during the Cultural Revolution.

Others also rallied behind Mr Chen, asking why CCTV should behave like a court and why it was the only media organisation to be allowed to speak to Mr Chen.

However, the All China Journalists Federation, which previously expressed some cautious support for Mr Chen, said he had made a "serious violation" of journalistic ethics and damaged the credibility of the media.