Wednesday, April 18th, 2007   9:23 am

中国关于网络控制的对抗

                                                        

The Australian

文/凯瑟琳.艾米提  译/邢荣勤

 

 

凯瑟琳.艾米提【康思吟】记者和李新德合影

 

    中国网络博客踩到高压线－－他们胆敢质疑贪污腐败官员，来自中国通讯记者凯瑟琳

 

    所有未经注册的网站都将被封闭，这一来自中国政府的威胁使得430000多名网络博客确信他们将被政府信息部门冷落。

  “感觉真的有点寒心，”位于北京的BDA媒体顾问机构常务董事邓肯.克拉克女士说，“关于注册问题的举措很显然是想要对网络活动进行控制和操纵。”为了避免被调控，她已经将自己的网站转移到国外。   

    李新德将要更加担心了。

    这位自由作家、新闻研究员目前正在为自己的网站积攒人气www.yuluncn.com,这个网站专门针对官员贪污腐败。这个网站在英文里叫做“Chinese Public Opinion Surveillance Net－－中国舆论监督网”。去年，由于它张贴了一位被指有腐败行为的中国重要城市副市长双膝跪地，恳求不要被曝光的照片，这个网站被关闭了。

    后来，这名官员很快被逮捕，他被指控贪赃530000美元，等待审讯。然而，第一个指控他的女子已经被判5年徒刑，而且据其申述，该官员曾经试图绑架并胁迫她。李新德相信这明显是副市长政府里亲信的报复行为。

    但是，李新德认为他的网站之所以被关闭，是因为该副市长的弟弟在公共安全局工作。“我们会按规定注册的。至今为止我们很多朋友的类似网站都已经通过注册了。我想不会有人告诉我们不应揭发反腐败的内容。”

    由于李新德只局限在揭示贪污腐败的事实，从不对党章质疑，他将自己的风险降到最低。他本人也是一名共产党员。他深信自己不仅有来自广大民众的支持，也包括党的支持。在北京一家匿名的宾馆房间里，李新德随身带着他的工作设备－－一台IBM笔记本电脑和一个数码相机，他说：“我们的目标都是一致的。”

  “很多有冤情的人从这个局转向那个局，没有丝毫结果，然后他们就十分气愤的来找我，大声的批判党。”他说，“我就会告诉他们，如果你信任党，就告诉我怎么回事。如果你不信任党，你也别来找我。因为不管什么事情最终都要靠党来解决。”

    李新德信奉这样的信条“要么公开，要么消失”。他迅速而秘密的行动，比当地腐败官员行动更快一步，四处深入调查曝光，直到被当地官员发现并阻止。他说：“如果没有网络，我不可能完成这些事情。”

    这个网站保持平均每天15000次的点击率。即使他真的有来自官方默许的支持，李新德的行为还是有很大风险。他宣称没有人会对他的关注无动于衷，然而他必须明白，如果他的调查过于接近真正的党的核心，他将会被命运抛弃。

    那些想通过网络质疑国家当权对于网络的独裁的网民，很快发现党对于网络的控制深入到每个角落。

    据说有大约40000名“网络警察”来维护“中国防火墙”，阻挡对任何他们不喜欢的站点的访问，并在出现后几分钟内清除颠覆性破坏分子的聊天室。

    据无国界的记者报道，中国的监狱里有至少61人因为在网上发布违法信息被拘留。

    然而，中国网络研究员郭亮说，对于网络注册的要求旨在反对网络赌博，色情及一些游戏站点。“当然，还是有空间，可以让个人上网不需注明身份，”他说，“我想也许政府可以对博客采取些政策，但现在还没有。”另一方面，他又指出，1997年的关于所有网站需注册的规定并不是强迫性的。“这就像猫和老鼠的游戏。我想每个政府都希望控制多一点，但问题在于如何进行，以及环境是否允许。”

                                                               

 感谢邢荣勤翻译

 

附英文版原文：

China fights to control the net
Catherine Armitage

2005 年 6 月 6 日
The Australian

Internet bloggers tread a fine line when they dare to question corrupt officials, writes China correspondent Catherine Armitage

ACHINESE government threat to close down unregistered websites has convinced just 430,000 to make themselves known at the Information Ministry — suggesting that most of the country’s estimated 4 million web loggers, or bloggers, are choosing to stay out in the cold.

"There’s a bit of a chill blowing through right now," said Duncan Clark, managing director of Beijing-based media consultancy BDA China. The campaign for registration is "obviously an effort to impose control" on web activities, said Mr Clark, who has moved his website offshore to avoid the regulators.

Li Xinde should be more worried than most.

The freelance investigative journalist is gaining fame for his site, www.yuluncn.com , which targets official corruption. The site, known in English as Chinese Public Opinion Surveillance Net, was shut down last year when it carried pictures of the allegedly corrupt vice-mayor of a major Chinese city on his knees apparently begging not to be exposed.

The official was arrested soon afterwards and awaits trial on accusations of stealing $530,000. But the woman who first accused him, and whom he allegedly tried to kidnap and intimidate, has already been sentenced to five years in prison in a case Li believes was mounted in revenge by the vice-mayor’s government cronies.

But Li says his site was shut down only because the vice-mayor’s younger brother worked in the Public Security Bureau. "We’ll register according to the regulations. Similar websites by my friends have all passed registration so far. I don’t think anyone will tell us not to post corruption-fighting content."

By confining his writings to factual exposures of corruption, and never questioning the party’s rule, Li minimises his risks. He is a Communist Party member. He believes he has the support not just of the general public, but of the party too. In an anonymous Beijing hotel room with his tools of trade — an IBM laptop and a digital camera — he says they share the same aims.

"There are many people (with grievances) who go around from department to department without result, and they come to me very upset and scolding the party loudly," he said.

"I tell them, `If you believe in the party, tell me what happened. if you don’t believe in the party don’t tell me, because everything that follows depends on the party for a solution’."

Li lives by the creed of "publish or perish", keeping one step ahead of corrupt local officials by working quickly and in secret, travelling in and out of places before he can be detained by the local officials he specialises in exposing. "I could not do what I do without the internet," he says.

The site gets an average of 15,000 hits a day. Even if he does have tacit official backing, Li’s activities are highly risky. He claims no one is immune from his attention, yet he must also know that he will be abandoned to his fate the moment his investigations sail too close to the true centres of party power.

"Netizens" who use the web to question China’s authoritarian rule quickly discover that the Party’s long arm reaches deep into cyberspace.

There are said to be some 40,000 "internet police" working to maintain the "Great Firewall of China" to block access to sites the party doesn’t like and cleanse chat rooms of subversive content, often within minutes of posting.

According to Reporters without Borders, at least 61 people are in Chinese jails for posting illegal messages or articles on the internet.

But Guo Liang, one of China’s leading internet researchers, said the main targets of the drive to register websites were online gambling, pornography and some game sites.

"There is still space for individuals to go online and (not) say who they are," he said. "I think maybe the Government will do something on bloggers but up to now nothing has happened."

On the other hand, he points out, a 1997 regulation requiring registration of all internet users is not enforced.

"It is a cat and mouse game. I think every government wants more control but the question is how, and whether conditions allow it."

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