A reporter for British-based TV News channel Sky News has been arrested live-on-air while filming in Beijing's Tiananmen Square.
Mark Stone and his cameraman, Andy Portch, were filming when they were approached by a police officer who told them to stop filming. Sky News says that they had pair had permission to film in the square, but they were apparently not showing their passes properly.
Stone continued reporting as police officers gathered to detain him, narrating his arrest to Sky News anchor, Anna Jones. As he was placed in a police van, he told Jones that the situation he was in was "surreal".
The video below shows Stone in the police van. At the end of the video, Sky News repeat footage of the moment Stone was arrested:
A spokesperson for Sky News told the Guardian's Josh Halliday that Stone was still being detained, but they expect him to be released shortly.
Stone, who has something of a reputation for being a tenacious reporter (witness these videos he filmed during the London riots), doesn't appear to have expected such an eventful day. Before he was detained today, he had tweeted this picture:
The @skynewsbeijing team about to be live on @skynews #sunrise. Tune in to find out what I'm talking about. twitter.com/Stone_SkyNews/…
— Mark Stone (@Stone_SkyNews) March 15, 2013