In China, an Editor Triumphs, and Fails

At the end of January, Zhang turned the screws tighter. At a large gathering of party discipline officials, party sources said, he asked sarcastically whether the party still owned the Daily. Then he declared that the media couldn't just monitor others; someone had to monitor them, too.

One of his deputies accused the Daily's executives of stealing state funds, essentially convicting Yu before trial, the officials said.

A few days later, Cheng delivered a defiant speech to his staff. Dressed in a black jacket and a cotton shirt and sitting at the head of a conference table in a room with more than 100 senior staff members, Cheng said a clash between the newspaper and "a few powerful individuals" had been building since the Sun Zhigang article was published, according to witnesses and a copy of the speech.

"Some people are sharpening their weapons. . . . This storm was bound to come sooner or later," he said. "We are already prepared. For the progress of the nation, the development of society and the happiness of the people, it is worth suffering some inconvenience and misery!"

"Whatever happens," he vowed, "we must not give up our ideals and beliefs."

A few weeks later, a local court convicted Yu of corruption for transferring bonus funds from the paper's advertising department to the newsroom, a common practice at many newspapers. The court also convicted him of bribery for paying a bonus to a supervisor at the Southern Daily, Li Minying.

In March, Yu was sentenced to 12 years in prison. Li received an 11-year sentence for accepting a bribe. The next day, police arrested Cheng.

The moves stunned the newspaper's supporters because there seemed to be no evidence of any crime and because the amount of money involved was relatively small. Journalists across the country signed petitions in protest, and many who had campaigned against the detention law began lobbying on behalf of the Southern Metropolis Daily.

As public outcry grew, three retired party chiefs in Guangdong wrote letters to Zhang urging him to review the case, arguing it had jeopardized the province's reputation as a pioneer of economic reform, party officials said. In an unusually public sign of division within the leadership, a Beijing magazine reported on two of the letters.

In June, the courts reduced Yu's sentence to eight years and Li's to six years on appeal. Cheng remains in prison but has not yet been charged with a crime, a sign that party leaders have not decided what to do.

The Southern Metropolis Daily is still publishing, but editors are more careful about criticizing local authorities. Almost all of the paper's key ad salesmen have resigned, and dozens of reporters have quit. In the first quarter of the year, officials said, the paper lost $1.5 million.

But the new tabloid started by Cheng in Beijing has adopted the aggressive style of the old Daily and appears to be prospering. "This is the way it works," said a senior editor in Guangzhou who spoke on condition of anonymity. "For every two steps forward, there is a step backward. But we're still going to keep pushing."