Internal Arrangements Made by the Epoch Times, the Falun Gong Newspaper, to Fabricate

Author: Hou Daojia

Yesterday, a friend who works for the Epoch Times in San Francisco, revealed a particularly interesting story. On the very night of April 10 when the China Central Television broadcast the news about Bo Xilai, the Epoch Times’ senior managers immediately convened a meeting of San Francisco-based backbone staff editors and reporters for discussion on how to use the “Bo Xilai and Wang Lijun” event to launch a psychological propaganda campaign against the Chinese government. This friend of mine was half-way home when notified of the intended meeting and therefore had to return to office right away to attend the meeting.

According to this friend, Vice President of the Epoch Times, Li Jiguang, presided over the meeting. At the meeting, Li orally conveyed the position held by the high-level leaders of Falun Gong on the propaganda campaign, that is, the Epoch Times can report the impact of the “Bo Xilai and Wang Lijun”event in any manner. However, in order to distinguish such reports (ie the reports on the “Bo Xilai and Wang Lijun ”event) from the reports in respect of the “democratic movement”, emphasis should be laid on two issues. First, reports published by the Eposh Times should highlight the negative impacts of the position of persecuting Falun Gong which are constantly adhered to by relevant senior Chinese government leaders, including Bo Xilai and Wang Lijun already dismissed by the Chinese government. Second, such reports on the senior Chinese government leaders should also highlight the impact of activities of the Falun Gong followers by mentioning as much as possible how Falun Gong followers have struggled against these leaders. The overall goal intended to achieve through this propaganda campaign is to improve the visibility of Falun Gong.

The friend said, at the meeting, Li Jiguang indicated that the Epoch Times would double the pay for reports in this respect for the purpose of maximizing the influence of this propaganda campaign. Moreover, additional rewards will be given to reports having more significant impacts. Li Jiguang repeatedly said at the meeting that, however much the cost of such reports is, it will be worth paying as long as the reports can cause trouble to the Chinese government, and the Epoch Times does not lack backing economically.

The friend said, Li Jiguang at the meeting requested that the Epoch Times staff editors should also be involved in writing the reports, or alternatively should ask their acquaintances to write such reports. Li smiled and claimed that “one must not let one’s own fertile water flow into outsiders’ fields”.

 

An Assessment of “Masterpiece” Reports published by the Epoch Times

Author: Lu Sheng

“I’ve been thinking that the Epoch Times, a newspaper run by Dafa (Falun Gong) disciples, has had a fairly big impact in the Chinese community. In fact, the Epoch Times newspaper is already the largest media outlet in the world; it covers many countries, including the entire United States. ” (Li Hongzhi, Teaching the Fa at the 2004 International Fa Conference in New York)

The Epoch Times, one of the major Falun Gong-operated media outlets, includes a relevant website and a newspaper. It is worth mentioning that any opinion-leading media outlet must ensure the genuineness of the six elements of news reports it publishes. These six elements are “when, where, who, what, where, and how”. Let us see whether some “masterpiece” news reports of the Epoch Times, the “global media outlet”, were genuinely fact-based or not:

Fabricated “Organ Harvesting”

On March 9, 2006, the Epoch Times website dished out the event of the so-called “organ harvesting”. Subsequently, a number of news media, including NHK, Japan, Hong Kong Phoenix TV, Hong Kong Ta Kung Pao conducted follow-up on-site interviews in the relevant hospital (where the event allegedly took place), and clearly pointed out that the so-called “(organ harvesting)concentration camps” did not actually exist. Officials from the U.S. Consulate General in Shenyang after a field survey said, “the function of this hospital is a hospital.” And a subsequent report released by the U.S. State Department on the two Sujiatun investigations revealed that “no evidence found indicated that the place, in addition to being used as public hospitals, is used for other purposes.”

Harry Wu, an Anti-Chinese government activist, published several articles in August 2006 in the pro-democracy media “Observation”. The articles were entitled “My Knowledge and Experience with the Falun Gong Media Reporting on The Sujiatun Concentration Camp Problem” and “My Viewpoints on the Falun Gong / Sujiatun Event”. Wu also wrote a letter to the U.S. Congress (on the Sujiatun Event issue). Both the articles and the letter considered that the reports published by Falun Gong media were not trustworthy.

The Deceptive “Photo Gate”

On July 28, 2010, a bombing accident took place in Nanjing. The Epoch Times immediately and purposely mis-used the July 2, 2010 photos of the Congo Democratic Republic tanker explosion (which caused death) to exaggerate the negative consequences of the Nanjing bombing insident. The Epoch Times published on July 28 a report entitled “The Cry Day Tragic Big Bang at Least Burned More Than 100 People in Nanjing”. On July 30, the Epoch Times again purposely misused the photos of the July-16 oil pipeline explosion near the city of Dalian to release another news report entitled “Nanjing Big Bang: Official Statements Different from the Folk Parlance”.

The Epoch Times has been questioned and criticized because it frequently publishes false reports.

Bobby Fletcher, an Asian-American social activist, pointed out on August 3, 2006 that what the Epoch Times did was simply to disseminate printed promotional materials produced by Falun Gong at its own expense. He said that“the financial connection between Falun Gong and the Epoch Times is not a secret.”

The New York Crank, a New York-based U.S. freelance writer, wrote on June 21, 2007 to denounce the Epoch Times news articles as confusing, saying that “it (the Epoch Times) is the worst written newspaper on the planet” and “the cause of the Epoch Times is to headline anything bad they can find about China (not a difficult task).”

Greg Butterfield, a member of the U.S. Workers World Party/a renowned journalist, on 14 September 2009 released an article accusing the Epoch Times of not being really “freedom-loving”. He also called on people “not to listen to the fascists of the Epoch Times!”

Peter Hankins from Britain on May 4, 2006 released an article in which he believed that the covert manner of operation embodied in the paper (ie the Epoch Times) was likely to alienate people.

Because of its notorious behavior, many countries and governments concerned also take an unwelcoming attitude towards the Epoch Times.

According to some foreign media reports on September 30, 2011, the Canadian Carnival organizers refused to allow the Epoch Times to set up a booth in the Carnival activities. Before the beginning of this carnival event, the Epoch Times raised in June the request to participate in the Carnival activities and had only been refused by the Carnival organizer. In August 2011, the Richmond Hill Summer Carnival organized by the York Region Chinese Association also refused to allow the Epoch Times to participate in its activities.

Let us also look at several articles recently published by the Epoch Times on the Chinese Communist Party leaders. These articles embodied several distinctive features:

First, the wordings of the articles including “It is reported that”,“It has been revealed”, “It is reported that” ,“informed sources said ”, and “according to the internal sources ”did hardly ensure that the time, place, characters and other basic news elements of the whole “intricate (news) story” can be verified. This approach of fabricating rumors and causing trouble was exactly the same as that used (previously) in starting the “organ harvesting” rumors.

Second, the eye-catching descriptions of “economic bribery”, “nepotism”, the “historical origins”, and the “foibles” (of the relevant Chinese government leaders) in these news reports were accompanied with no indication of their sources of information, or any citation of the references. The cause and consequences as well as the process and other basic elements of the news stories were purely absent and fabricated. Even the accompanying pictures had obvious traces of computer technology processing. The approach used this time again looked very similar to that used previously to forge the “photo gate” rumor.

Fabrication and distortion of facts reflects a morbid state of mind. Rumor-fabrication derives from moral corruption. While distortion of facts does not necessarily lead to rumor fabrication, one who starts rumors acts surely with a morbid mentality. The Epoch Times’ fabrication of rumors reflects not only the morbid psychology of its staff but also the moral turpitude of the Falun Gong group and Li Hongzhi.