The new channel is designed to improve China’s image, but experts believe Beijing simply wants to spread its “official” information to counter foreign criticism. Newscast becomes a tool to boost China’s power.

Beijing (AsiaNews/Agencies) – China's state news agency Xinhua has launched a 24-hour global news channel in English, CNC World, part of the China Xinhua News Network Corporation (CNC), in order to present "an international vision with a China perspective” by broadcasting “news reports in a timely way and objectively” that can “be a new source of information for global audiences," said Xinhua’s President Li Congjun at the launch ceremony in Beijing. For a number of analysts however, the new channel represents China’s attempt to pass on its “official” version, and sweep under the rug the fact that it closely censors its own media.

The new English-language channel (with a peace dove for logo) will allow anyone to know the CNC’s and thus the Chinese government’s point of view. It aims to reach 50 million viewers in Europe, North America and Africa within its first year, CNC World Controller Wu Jincai said.

Analysts note that China has spent billions of dollars to extend its influence abroad, especially in the West. It has set up two press agencies, two newspapers, and two English-language channels.

In July of last year, CCTV began broadcasting in Arabic to some 300 million potential viewers in 22 countries in the Middle East and North Africa. It was already broadcasting in English, French and Spanish as well as Chinese.

“It has become an urgent strategic task for us to make our communication capability match our international status,” Propaganda Chief Liu Yunshan wrote in a New Year's essay for the party's main ideological journal. “Nowadays, nations which have more advanced skills and better capability in communications will be more influential in the world and can spread their values further.”

It is estimated that Beijing has already invested 15 billion yuan (US$ 2.2 billion) in CCTV, the same for Xinhua and 2 billion yuan (US$ 300 million) in the China News agency, to improve their look and graphic designs as well as to hire more journalists, expand foreign bureaus and finance original programming.

The reason for all this is that if at home they can easily restrict national media Chinese authorities cannot do the same abroad. They cannot for instance determine what is said about their crackdown against the media, pro-democracy activists, or their violence in Tibet and Xinjiang. They cannot give their spin on restrictions on religious freedom or topics on which the state claims an official monopoly over the truth.

The impact of the violent crackdown in Tibet in March 2008 and the widespread protests that met the Olympic torch relay ahead of the Beijing Olympics were a clarion call for Beijing—they highlighted the huge cracks in China’s propaganda machine, whose purpose is to project the image of an efficient and harmonious nation to counter what it considers lies on foreign media.

Indeed, Beijing has been forced to ratchet up censorship, introducing rigid controls and bans in the pre-Olympic period that outlasted the Games held in August 2008.

Indeed, even if Chinese media have “a very bad influence on Chinese people, particularly because ordinary people who have limited sources of information cannot make comparisons, [. . .] their thoughts are [still] guided by CCTV,” magazine editor Ran Yunfei said.

Still, of all the forms of media, internet poses the greatest danger to China’s rulers. For this reason, the government has deployed tens of thousands of "cyber police" to block websites, patrol cybercafés, and track down activists who post undesirable material online. China’s cyber-patrols have also launched Trojan-horse attacks to breach computers and allow infiltrators to corrupt or transfer files remotely.

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