China Arrests Anti-Corruption Blogger 113
quantr tips this news from Bloomberg:
"A Chinese journalist who posted allegations of corrupt dealings during the privatization of state-owned assets has been formally arrested on a defamation charge, his lawyer said. The Beijing People's Procuratorate approved Liu Hu's arrest on Sept. 30, lawyer Zhou Ze said by phone yesterday. Liu, who worked for the Guangzhou-based New Express, had been in detention since Aug. 24, according to Zhou. Liu's arrest adds to evidence that the government is stepping up a crackdown against people who go online with revelations of official malfeasance. At the same time that the Communist Party has vowed to get tough on corruption, authorities have targeted outspoken bloggers and announced that people who post comments deemed defamatory could face as much as three years behind bars."
obvious conclusion is obvious (Score:4, Insightful)
They've simply defined "corruption" as "Speaking out against the government." As experienced coders, you should all be familiar with this type of "operator overload" :-(
Re:News For Nerds (Score:5, Insightful)
Blog about corruption, get arrested for defamation.
That's pretty much the point of the YRO section of Slashdot.
You know, Your Rights Online.
At this rate, I won't be surprised to see this start happening in other countries which are supposed to be against this sort of thing. *cough* America *cough*
Re:News For Nerds (Score:4, Insightful)
America is not a country, it's a continent.
No, dink, it's a common shortening of the name for a country; specifically, the United States of America.
You're thinking of North America, or maybe South America, or possibly the quasi-continent in-between known as Central America, but there is no continent that is known as just "America."
Of course, we all know that nobody on the internet is dense and uninformed enough to actually believe in the amiguity you're referring to, so it pretty much goes without saying that your comment is pure troll and nothing else. The real question is, why? What was your purpose behind leaving such an obviously stupid and pointless comment? For the attention?
Well, congrats, you got it: We all now know how stupidly uptight and unreasonable you can be. Bet your parents are real proud.
Re:News For Nerds (Score:3, Insightful)
Snowden made no effort to follow established whistleblower protocols.
And he shouldn't have, because if he had, the public still wouldn't know about the NSA surveillance, and everyone else wouldn't be aware of the specifics. What you ask for is that he let politicians blow the fact that the government is blatantly violating the constitution under the rug.
But it does not excuse him from punishment for those illegal actions.
I damn well think it should; the people who should be arrested are the politicians who supported this and everyone directly involved in the NSA.