FILE – Journalist Ursula Gauthier, pictured in February 2003, published a story last month that suggested China was using the recent terrorist attacks in Paris to justify crackdowns on Muslim Uighurs in northwestern China.
December 25, 2015 10:12 PM
A French journalist working in China said Friday that the Chinese government had ordered her to leave the country within a week, following her reports about the Muslim Uighur minority.
Ursula Gauthier, the Beijing correspondent of the weekly L’Obs news magazine, said China’s Foreign Ministry will not renew her press credentials, which are set to expire at the end of December, unless she publicly recants one of her stories.
Gauthier published a story last month that suggested China was using the recent terrorist attacks in Paris to justify crackdowns on Muslim Uighurs in northwestern China.
Chinese officials have said the article slandered government policies, and several Chinese state-run media outlets published editorials condemning the story.
L’Obs stood by its correspondent, saying in an editorial that Gauthier’s eviction from China represented a “major incident” between China and France.
French officials have asked Chinese authorities to reverse their decision. The French Foreign Ministry said Friday that it regretted that Gauthier’s visa would not be renewed and said “France would like to remind all how important it is for journalists to be able to work everywhere in the world.”
