Chinese state newspaper People’s Daily has defended its decision not to publish an article submitted last month by the US ambassador to China on the grounds it was “full of loopholes”.
The mouthpiece of China’s ruling Communist Party issued a statement on Thursday after Washington accused Beijing of being hypocritical for refusing to run the piece, titled “Resetting the Relationship Based on Reciprocity”.
“We have told the US embassy that the op-ed in the name of Ambassador [Terry] Branstad we received this time is full of loopholes and seriously inconsistent with the facts,” the newspaper said, without specifying the alleged inaccuracies.
“The People’s Daily’s response once again exposes the Chinese Communist Party’s fear of free speech and serious intellectual debate – as well as Beijing’s hypocrisy when it complains about lack of fair and reciprocal treatment in other countries,” Pompeo said in a statement late on Wednesday.
In a statement on Thursday, the paper said it had the right, like U.S. media, to decide what it publishes and to make necessary edits, decrying Pompeo’s remarks as a vicious attack on Chinese media.
“It is extremely ironic that on the one hand the U.S. side rudely and unreasonably supresses Chinese media like the People’s Daily as Communist Party ‘propaganda machines’, and on the other demands they disseminate wrong points of view for the United States.”❏
