- The US
State Department has classified another four Chinese state-runmedia outlets as foreign missions. - This brings the number of Chinese media outlets classified this way to nine.
- The move is likely to prompt retaliation from
China , escalating a feud between the two nations, the New York Times reported.
The State Department on Monday announced that it has designated four more Chinese state-run media outlets as foreign mission operating in the US.
The move brings the total number of Chinese media classified this was to nine, and will likely prompt retaliation from China, The New York Times reported.
"These nine entities all meet the definition of a foreign mission under the Foreign Missions Act, which is to say that they are "substantially owned or effectively controlled" by a foreign government," the a statement from the State Department said.
"The decision to designate these entities is not based on any content produced by these entities, nor does it place any restrictions on what the designated entities may publish in the United States," the statement continued. "It simply recognizes them for what they are."
The latest outlets to be included in the list of foreign missions include China Central Television, China
The groups will be asked to send to the department a complete roster of employees in the United States and a list of their real estate holdings, The Times reported.
David R. Stilwell, the assistant secretary for East Asia and the Pacific, declined to say in a telephone briefing with reporters — including from The Times — what actions the United States might then take based on that information.
The US and China have been going back and forth for the last few months taking action against foreign media.
In February, after the US designated the first five Chinese news organizations as foreign agents, and after a move by China to expel three journalists for The Wall Street Journal, the Trump administration imposed visa quotas the Chinese outlets, The Times reported.
As a result, 60 foreign employees lost their visas. The Chinese government then expelled journalists for The Times, The Washington Post, and The Wall Street Journal. In all 13 reporters for these outlets were removed from China, the Times reported.
In its statement on Monday, the State Department said that over the last decade under General Secretary Xi Jinping's tenure, the communist party has reorganized the state-run media in China to exert even more direct control over them.
"In short, while Western media are beholden to the truth, PRC media are beholden to the Chinese Communist Party," the State Department wrote.
During the telephone briefing about press freedoms in China and the US, a Reuters reporter tried to ask Stilwell a question about former national security adviser John Bolton's upcoming book.
President Donald Trump has sued Bolton in an attempt to prevent the publication of his memoir, which includes a number of explosive claims about his time in the administration.
Morgan Ortagus, a State Department spokeswoman, said the question was inappropriate and told the AT&T operator to "mute that line," the Times reported.
- Read more
- Trump lashes out against John Bolton in response to damning allegations in tell-all memoir
- Here are the most explosive claims former national security adviser John Bolton made about Trump in his upcoming book
- Trump didn't know Britain was a nuclear power and inquired whether Finland was part of Russia, according to John Bolton's bombshell memoir