April 21, 2006

When a protester heckled Chinese President Hu Jintao yesterday, the television feed back to China was immediately blacked out - and Chinese exiles weren't surprised.

CNN International said its signal to China was interrupted twice: when Falun Gong activist Wenyi Wang was shouting, and later when the network briefly reported on the incident.

Ironically, Wang's outburst - and the censorship of the TV feed - came shortly after President Bush urged Hu to allow "the Chinese people the freedom to assemble, to speak freely and to worship."

Chinese people here weren't surprised.

"Controlling the news is nothing new" to the Chinese, said Peter Kwong, professor of Asian-American studies at Hunter College. "China has been doing this kind of thing before."

"It's not surprising," said Li-Zhi Fang, a professor of physics at the University of Arizona who was granted asylum during the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests. "Chinese TV is controlled by the party. . . . All the TV and newspaper is their tool."

Even the Internet isn't free, they say. Search engine Google has agreed to edit its content on its Chinese Web sites in order to continue to do business with Beijing.

Chinese New Yorkers said Wang was courageous to confront Hu about China's heavy-handed tactics with Falun Gong members.

"They [the Chinese government] are lying to the people," said Anna Tam, 28, a nurse at NYU Medical Center. "To me it breaks my heart. Being a Chinese-American, I would love to go there."

Not all were in agreement with Wang because the Falun Gong movement has received a mixed reception among Chinese here.

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