Hong Kong-Chinese state media celebrate the movement of President Donald Trump to the voice of the United States and other media funded by the United States government that reject authoritarian regimes.
His executive order on Friday by dismantling Voice of America, Radio Free Asia and other media have been criticized as another blow to the soft power efforts of the US.
The Chinese government, where the media are closely controlled by the ruler Chinese Communist Party, has long criticized VOA coverage and other media funded by the United States government. In an editorial on Monday, the global nationalist tabloids backed by the State called a “lies factory” with a “terrible history” when it comes to reports related to China.
From alleged violations of human rights in the Chinese region of Xinjiang to the origins of the Coronavirus and Chinese military aggression in the South China Sea, “almost all malicious falsehood over China have VOA digital footprints everywhere.” The editorial said, calling the media as a “first -line propaganda tool.”
Voa, that some Republicans had criticized as biased against the conservatives, has been in Trump’s sights since his first term.
Last year the fears for the outlet were raised when he said he wanted him to be directed by Ally Kari Lake, a former news presenter who accused journalists of Anti-Trump bias during his two failed races for the state position in Arizona. On the other hand, she became a special advisor to the Global Media Agency of the Global Media, the United States Independent Government Agency that supervises Voice of America, Radio Free Europe/Radio Free Liberty, Radio Free Asia and other media editorially independent.
“From top to bottom, this agency is a giant rot and a burden for the US taxpayer, a national security risk for this nation, and irremediably broken,” Lake said in a statement on Saturday.
Elon Musk, who leads Trump’s government reduction initiative, asked that VOA was closed last month, saying: “Nobody listens to them” and “is radical left the crazy people speaking themselves by speaking themselves while bowing” the money of the taxpayers.
That language was reflected in a press release from the White House on Saturday promoting VOA dismantling.
“Taxpayers are no longer in the radical propaganda hook,” he said.
The United States Global Media Agency is one of the seven government entities designated in the Executive Order to be “eliminated to the maximum extent in accordance with the applicable law.” The others are the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, the Woodrow Wilson Scholars International Center, the Museum and Library Services Institute, the Interagence Board of Homeless Persons, the Fund of Community Development Financial Institutions and the Minority Business Development Agency.
VOA director Michael Abramowitz said on Saturday that the more than 1,300 employees of The Outlet had been placed on administrative license.
VOA, which was founded in 1942, “promotes freedom and democracy worldwide by telling the history of the United States,” Abramowitz said on LinkedIn, “providing objective and balanced news and information, especially for those who live under tyranny.”
Chinese nationalist commentators were lush.
“Almost all Chinese know about VOA because it is a symbolic tool of the United States for ideological infiltration in China,” Hu Xijin, former editor in Chief of Global Times, wrote on Sunday, on Sunday on the Chinese Weibo social media platform, calling the closure of VOA and Radio Free Asia “truly gratifying.”
The dismantling of VOA, whose award -winning journalism reached almost 360 million people every week in almost 50 languages, including Mandarin and Cantonese, occurs when China is aggressively expanding the overall scope of its own means funded by the State.
“The disappearance of this type of media in the Chinese language will definitely leave a hole in the supply of information,” said Rose Luqiu, associate head of the journalism department of the Baptist University of Hong Kong, and added that VOA has provided “many Chinese news.”
“Most people in China consume news in Chinese, not in English, and not many media provided Chinese content,” he added.
Press freedom organizations asked Congress to intervene.
Voa dismantling “threatens press freedom worldwide and denies 80 years of American history by supporting a free flow of information,” journalists without borders said in a statement, and added that the decision endangered the 10 employees of the United States agency for the global media that are currently detained abroad in relation to their journalistic work.
Stephen Capus, president and executive director of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, said in a statement on Saturday to close his organization “would be a massive gift for the enemies of the United States.”
“Giving our adversaries a victory will make them stronger and more weak,” he said.
Peter Guo reported from Hong Kong and Mithil Aggarwal in New Delhi.
