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China issues new regulations to control Internet news sites
(AP)

25 September 2005


BEIJING - China is imposing new regulations to control content on its news Web sites, the government said on Sunday, another step in its ongoing effort to police a rapidly expanding Internet population.

The rules, issued by the Ministry of Information Industry and the State Council, China’s cabinet, will “standardize the management of news and information” in the country, the official Xinhua News Agency said. They take effect immediately, it said.

The report did not give any details on the regulations but said sites should only post news on current events and politics. It did not define what would be acceptable under those categories.

Only “healthy and civilized news and information that is beneficial to the improvement of the quality of the nation, beneficial to its economic development and conducive to social progress” will be allowed, Xinhua said.

It added: “The sites are prohibited from spreading news and information that goes against state security and public interest.”

China’s population of Internet users has surpassed 100 million and is the world’s second largest after the United States, which has 135 million.

While the communist government encourages Internet use for education and business, it also keeps an extremely tight rein over online content, usually blocking material it deems subversive or pornographic. Online dissidents who post essays questioning government actions and policies or those who express their opinions in chatrooms are regularly arrested and charged under vaguely worded state security laws.

Earlier this month, a French media watchdog group said e-mail account information provided by Internet powerhouse Yahoo Inc. helped lead to the convictio"