In an interview with CCTV, Chen Yongzhou said he took bribes to publish phony stories about industrial giant Zoomlion. Fellow journalists have doubts about his confession, suspecting instead that he was "forced" to make a retraction. In recent days, his newspaper had called for his release in its front-page.

Guangzhou (AsiaNews) - This morning, Chen Yongzhou, a journalist with the Guangzhou-based New Express newspaper arrested after exposing corruption in a major local company, "confessed" his crimes on state television. Interviewed by China Central TV (CCTV), the reporter admitted that he had accepted bribes to publish articles against the industrial giant Zoomlion.

The unexpected twist of events surprised China's journalists who in the past week had rallied behind Chen, calling for his release. In a rare move, his newspaper did the same, publishing its demand twice using three big Chinese in its front-page, on Wednesday and Friday.

Until last month, Chen had published more than ten articles, reporting fraudulent practices in in Zoomlion.

Speaking on CCTV however, Chen explained that almost all of the stories were pre-written and fed to him by a third party on the condition that they be published under his by-line.

He said he was paid thousands of yuan each time he delivered the "task". He did not however disclose the identity of the third party that supplied him the stories.

"I am willing to confess and repent my crimes," Chen said. "I'd like to apologise to Zoomlion, its shareholders, the media groups whose credibility suffered [because of me] and my family," he added. "I did this mainly because I hankered after money and fame. I've been used. I've realised my wrongdoing."

The New Express has not yet reacted to the interview. However, many analysts and advocates of freedom of the press have criticised "televised confessions", a widespread practice used especially in political or high profile cases, such as Chen. For them, they often take place in an environment of intimidation and human rights violations.

 "The victim of the 'false reports' should have resorted to lawsuits to hold Chen responsible, and the newspaper could have fired him," wrote Zhu Xuedong, a prominent Beijing-based magazine editor, on his microblog. "It is wrong to lay all the blames on Chen"; it appears in fact that "the newspaper's management was also problematic."

In addition, Zhu said the scene of Chen confessing in front of a camera reminded him of the "criticism and attack sessions" held during the Cultural Revolution, a violent political tool used between 1966 and 1976 to persecuted millions.

Zhu's comments have already been reposted more than 1,400 times on Saturday.

• china
• guandong
• express
• reporter
• chen
• yongzhou
• zoomlion
• arrest
• retraction