China sets up ‘no reporting’ zones to gag coverage of jasmine revolt

“The police provided reasonable guidance,and the journalists should understand and cooperate,” said Jiang Yu,spokesperson for the foreign ministry.

“If both sides take this attitude,we can minimise the occurrence of such incidents,” he was quoted as saying by the report.

Following a call on the Internet to stage a Chinese ‘Jasmine Revolution’,the government responded by a large show of force even though no large-scale demonstrations surfaced. Last week,media reports said the words ‘Jasmine Revolution’,borrowed from the successful Tunisian revolt,were blocked on social networking websites and on Internet search engines.

NYT said officials have informed journalists that one of the capital’s main shopping districts,Wangfujing,and People’s Square in the heart of Shanghai are either off limits or require a special permit for taking photographs and conducting interviews.

The newspaper said that last Sunday when there was a call for rallies in more than 20 cities across the country,journalists trying to cover the rallies were assaulted.

A Bloomberg News videographer was seriously beaten up by plainclothes security agents,according to the Foreign Correspondents Club of China.

The association also said that employees from five news organisations reported that some material or images had been confiscated and that nine other journalists had been detained for as long as four hours,’The Times’ said.

The Chinese news media has reportedly been barred from even discussing the rallies.