Completing their one-month-long assignment in Taiwan, two Chinese journalists from the Xinhua News Agency, Fan Liqing (
"Partial success is a good start," Chen told the Taipei Times yesterday, concluding his first reporting trip in Taiwan to better promote cross-strait news exchange.
Chen, however, said that he hoped Taiwan authorities would review and relax related regulations to allow journalists from China more freedom than they have now to conduct interviews in Taiwan.
PHOTO: CHIANG YING-YING, TAIPEI TIMES
"We can only cover news in the Taipei metropolitan area. I hope we can go elsewhere, whenever we want, and without having to obtain individual permits [from the Government Information Office (GIO)]," Chen said.
During their stay in Taiwan, both he and Fan were allowed to visit southern and central Taiwan after they had submitted their plans first to the GIO for review.
Chen said he was happy with the assistance provided by the GIO and that both he and Fan will probably return in three months.
Meanwhile, two of Chen's colleagues, Zhao Wei (
Contrasting Chen's complaints, Tsai Ting-yu (蔡婷玉), an Eastern TV reporter who is currently posted in Beijing, yesterday told the Taipei Times that Chinese reporters posted in Taiwan enjoy more freedom than reporters from Taiwan do in China.
"Each of us [Taiwanese reporters in China] was granted a reporter's permit the moment we arrived here. But unlike Chen and Fan, the permit alone is not enough for us to gain access to official news events. We have to inform [the authorities] first and get approval before we are let in," Tsai said, adding that time-consuming application procedures sometimes interfere with their hectic reporting schedules.
Tsai added that Chinese officials, unlike their Taiwanese counterparts, are "very much politically alert and, therefore, particularly cautious of making comments" to the Taiwanese media.
Hence, Tsai said, Taiwanese reporters never get the chance to talk to any political heavyweights in China.
Though the visiting journalists from China were constrained by certain regulations, Fan and Chen were able to meet face-to-face with top-ranking officials and granted exclusive interviews with them, including DPP Chairman Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) and Judicial Yuan President Weng Yueh-sheng (翁岳生).
The courtesy treatment the Chinese reporters received at times became the envy of their Taiwanese colleagues, who usually don't have the chance to exclusively interview these high-ranking officials.
Reporters from both sides of the Strait shared the same experience of being monitored. Tsai said that she was used to "being accompanied by undercover security people" on her reporting trips while Chen said he strongly suspected his phone was once tapped. "You just know it. That is the customary practice," Chen said.
The demand for cross-strait news reports is rising. Eastern TV started basing reporters in China last March while TVBS has had reporters posted in China since 1998.
Though Chinese reporters took the step later, both Fan's and Chen's news reports about Taiwan had attracted a lot of Chinese readers, Chen said.
"China has a desperate need to get to know Taiwan better because we were taught in schools that Taiwan is a part of China and, therefore, we are certainly interested in knowing what is happening [there]," Chen added.
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