Hong Kong entertainer removes sensitive news story from mainland Chinese blog
Min Lee, AP Entertainment Write
HONG KONG — A Hong Kong actress-singer has removed a news story about an activist’s court case from her mainland Chinese blog, purportedly to placate angered fans, underscoring the difficulty of navigating sensitive subjects in China’s tightly controlled cyberspace.
Hong Kong entertainer Gigi Leung on Wednesday posted an excerpt of a news story about the trial of Zhao Lianhai on her blog hosted by mainland Internet company Sina Corp., Leung’s agent, Jacky Wong, told The Associated Press in a phone interview Thursday. Zhao had advocated on behalf of parents whose children were sickened in a tainted milk scandal and pleaded innocent to charges of inciting social disorder on Tuesday.
But Leung removed the posting later the same day, Wong said, sparking speculation that the Hong Kong actress-singer was bending to Chinese censors. “Gigi Leung is muzzled,” Hong Kong newspaper Apple Daily wrote in a headline.
Wong denied Chinese authorities had forced Leung to edit her blog, saying instead that the entertainer had acted in response to postings from some of the blog’s nearly 473,000 followers who left messages saying they were upset by the article.
Calls to a Sina public relations official seeking comment went unanswered.
After deleting the news story, Leung posted another message saying, “The mainland has its own rules. If I need to delete something, so be it. But I still don’t like to see incidents that are unfair, especially if they happen to regular people.”
With their native market largely saturated, Hong Kong entertainers have a huge stake in the booming mainland market, and it’s in their vested interest to toe the Chinese government line. But because of cultural differences between the former British colony that enjoys Western-style civil liberties, Hong Kongers can run into trouble when confronted with the mainland’s stricter controls.
Beijing has drawn international criticism for its restrictions on Internet freedom — sites such as Facebook, YouTube and Twitter are blocked — and sophisticated cyberspying operations.
Censors block Web sites on topics they consider politically sensitive like Tibet and the 1989 crackdown on pro-democracy protesters at Tiananmen Square. Google began redirecting search queries from mainland China to the servers based in the freer territory of Hong Kong last week, saying it didn’t want results to be censored any more.
