Chinese media and the invasion

China Media Coverage of Putin’s Invasion of Ukraine

“The first casualty of war is truth.” How true!

I’ve been following China’s coverage with fascination and disgust. Although China claims to be neutral on the matter and even offers itself as a peace maker, its media coverage has more or less been following the Russian line. To start with, instead of Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, it is termed as ‘Russian and Ukraine conflict’. It hardly mentions the immense suffering of the civilians in Ukraine or its people’s incredible courageous resistance, which moved the people around the world.

When Russia made false claim that Pentagon has been financing biological weapons labs in Ukraine, China reported it as truth. How dangerous it is! Putin may use it as a false flag to use biological weapons. Here’s NYT’s report on the issue.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/10/us/politics/russia-ukraine-china-bioweapons.html

How ridiculous that China now blames the U.S and Nato for the invasion. See attached the screen shot of the Chinese article.

A professor Zhang Wenmu from Beihang University, a nationalistic academic, penned a piece “Why has Ukraine Nazi-ized”. There’s a lot of discussion on the topic on the internet. Again, it is ridiculous! The Ukraine president Zelensky is a Jew. Why would he want his country to Nazi-ized?

There’s been a lot of fake news. From a group on Wechat called Friends in London, someone posted a video clip about a week ago, showing Putin crying over the death of Russian soldiers and when their bodies were carried back to Russia, the ordinary people knelt down on the road side, to show their respect. Completely false! If Putin cares about his soldiers, he wouldn’t have sent them over to Ukraine. He is a narcissistic who is utterly indifferent to human sufferings.

Besides, although the Russian people have been fed lies, most of them don’t really want the war. In Meknes, I met a Russian couple who were on holiday in Morocco. He said only about 10 % of Russians, mostly uneducated or in rural Russia, supports the war. The couple themselves hate the war, but nevertheless have felt the negative impact on them. They had to take US dollar cash with them as they are unable to pay with their visa card. The Morocco holiday might be their last foreign trip for a long while. “We’ll become like the North Koreans, isolated in the world,” the husband, an advertising executive, said gloomily.

On the positive side, some honest Chinese academic have expressed their dismay over the invasion. I mentioned this in an earlier post.

Also, two ordinary Chinese guys, Old Zhao (老赵 lǎo zhào) and Wáng Jíxián 王吉 have been posting videos from Ukraine, showing the terrible suffering of the ordinary people in Ukraine. One of them said that he is running a risk of being labeled as a spy, still he’d like to show the Chinese people the truth.

I am travelling in Morocco. Like some countries in Africa, Morocco, fearing of upsetting Rusian, chose to abstain in the UN General Assembly’s vote. People are really worried, mainly about the negative economic impact on the country. One guide said some Moroccans believe that there might be a third world war between the west and the allies among Russia, China and North Korea!

Alas, would the Chinese leaders really want that?

I do hope our leaders will behave like a responsible world leader and show its human face!

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