China Announces Clampdown On News Coverage of Courts

New Rules Make Official Spokesmen Only Source of Information

BEIJING, Sept. 13 -- A new effort to punish anyone who leaks information from China's courts is part of a clampdown on the news media ahead of a leadership conference next year, experts said Wednesday.

China's highest court announced rules this week under which officials who give journalists "improper" news will face severe punishment, the official New China News Agency said. Information will be released only through a newly created system of court spokesmen.

In addition to blocking coverage before the leadership conference, the clampdown appeared designed to limit information on the fate of a number of prominent officials recently arrested on corruption charges. The cases, involving a vice mayor of Beijing and a top Shanghai official, among others, could expand to implicate other authorities and are being closely watched.

Officials at China's Supreme People's Court did not detail the penalties for those who leak information. But they did announce what were described as new rules outlining what information could not be divulged.

The rules forbid the release of news related to national secrets, business secrets and personal information, including in cases related to adolescents and in cases that are not tried publicly. Appraisals of court cases made by powerful trial committees cannot be released, nor can any documents that pass through upper- and lower-level courts. The release of "other information that is not allowed to be disseminated to the public as instructed by the leaders of the courts" is also forbidden, state media said.

It was unclear how the new rules differed from the old ones, as Chinese courts already refuse to release verdicts and basic information. But the announcement about punishing officials for leaking information follows other measures designed to curb media coverage, experts said.

In July, for example, officials announced draft legislation to fine the media for unauthorized reporting on natural disasters and other "sudden incidents," angering both Chinese media and foreign news organizations, which are also expected to obey the new rules. The government watchdog for newspapers, television and radio has also warned that it would step up its monitoring during several important anniversaries this year, such as those marking the start of the Cultural Revolution, the founding of the Communist Party and the death of Mao Zedong.

The ban on releasing court information was criticized by He Weifang, a legal scholar at Beijing University, who said the Supreme People's Court had overstepped its authority.

The National People's Congress, not the Supreme People's Court, regulates the relationship between courts and the media, He said. "According to China's constitution, a higher court guides and supervises the work of a lower-level court through appeals, changing the original sentence or sending the case back for retrial. But the lower-level court doesn't report to a higher-level court. I think the Supreme People's Court is exceeding its powers this time by making these regulations," he said.

"The Chinese government has been tightening the control of information and freedom of press for the past two to three years," He added. "Some experts believe it's just temporary, in order to maintain the current political order and prepare for bigger adjustments in the future. Others think this is just the normal practice of the authorities and there is no other alternative."

The strengthening of control could also be in preparation for the 2008 Olympic Games and for the 17th Party Congress next fall, at which President Hu Jintao will propose leadership changes and possibly identify his successor.

"China will expect its new leaders in the coming 17th Party Congress next year. It's a sensitive moment. You can't look at these issues separately," said a senior editor at a national magazine that often covers corruption cases. He spoke on condition of anonymity for fear he or his magazine could face repercussions. "It's a series of actions by the government in order to tighten control of the flow of information," he said.

Similar regulations will be made and publicized by other government departments in the near future, the editor predicted.

"There have been many high-ranking corrupt officials that have been shuang gui' ed, many of which will go through the legal system very soon," he said, using a term for the Communist Party's punishment of top officials through detention and forced confession. "It's very obvious that media both at home and abroad want to nose into related information from the courts."

Researcher Jin Ling contributed to this report.