AP: China Suspends BBC World TV Channel

BEIJING (AP)--China has suspended a transmission of the BBC World TV channel that reaches thousands of foreigners across the country after it objected to a news item dealing with the banned Falun Gong spiritual movement, the broadcaster said Thursday.

The satellite service remained suspended Thursday, four days after the item aired, the British Broadcasting Corp. said. Other satellites continued to bring the BBC into China, however.

"We are aware that an item which appeared on BBC World ... has caused some concern to the Chinese authorities," a BBC statement said.

The cut-off came after a broadcast on the fifth anniversary of Hong Kong's July 1, 1997, handover from Britain to China--a news item that included material on Falun Gong, the spiritual movement banned by the Chinese government in 1999.

The channel said it was trying to understand the precise nature of the objection, but assumed it dealt with the Falun Gong. The BBC said China had offered no information on when the service might be reinstated.

In Beijing, the State General Bureau of Radio, Television and Film refused comment, asking for questions to be sent by fax. There was no response to the fax by late Thursday. The BBC said transmissions were cut off from a satellite known as Chinese Sinosat 1 and affected only viewers in China, including those in 60,000 up-market hotel rooms across the country and apartment blocks where foreigners live. That is the only officially authorized BBC transmission in China.

China's broadcasters, like its other media, are state-controlled and kept on a tight leash. Foreign media are allowed more leeway, but retributions against reporting that irritates the government are not uncommon.