Internet giant Google’s unwillingness to obey Chinese law is to blame for the shutdown of its hugely popular e-mail service, state-run media said yesterday after the last easy way to access Gmail in China was apparently blocked.
“China welcomes the company to do business on the prerequisite that it obeys Chinese law; however Google values more its reluctance to be restricted by Chinese law, resulting in conflict,” the Global Times said in an editorial.
Gmail — the world’s biggest e-mail service — has been largely inaccessible from within China since the runup to the 25th anniversary in June of the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators.
Users could access the service by using third-party mail applications, rather than the Web page, but Jeremy Goldkorn, the founder of Danwei, a Beijing-based firm that tracks Chinese media and the Internet, said those ways of connecting were also barred by the government in recent days.
China operates the world’s most extensive and sophisticated Internet censorship system, known as the “Great Firewall.”
Foreign Web sites such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube are routinely blocked and content that the Chinese Communist Party deems offensive is often quickly deleted.
Google withdrew from China in 2010 after a fallout with Beijing over censorship issues.
“The issue at heart is to what extent Google is willing to obey Chinese law, on which China’s attitude is steadfast,” said the Global Times, which is close to the party.
Access problems could be “caused by the China side, by Google itself or a combination of the two,” it added.
A Google spokesman told reporters on Monday that internal check found “nothing wrong on our end.”
If China did block Gmail, the Global Times said it “must have been prompted by newly emerged security reasons” and users should “accept the reality.”
“We only need to have faith that China has its own logic in terms of Internet policy and it is made and runs in accordance with the country’s fundamental interests,” it added.
Nonetheless, the editorial acknowledged: “We don’t want to be shut off, as it obviously doesn’t serve our own interests.”
Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokeswoman Hua Chunying (華春瑩) said she was “not aware” of the blocking of the service when asked about the issue at a regular press conference on Monday.
“I would like to stress that China always welcomes and supports foreign investors’ legal business operations in China,” she said.
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