BBC disinformation campaign

By Jerry Grey

December 27th, 2004

The BBC have done it again in an article* entitled: “A dam ignited rare Tibetan protests. They ended in beatings and arrests, BBC finds”. This isn’t misinformation, these aren’t journalistic errors, this is a deliberate distortion of facts.

It’s fair to infer that the BBC have investigated an incident related to a dam they would like us to believe is in Tibet and that they have evidence of beatings and arrests of Tibetans.

But this hasn’t happened in Tibet, the story was widely reported 10 months ago and despite allegations, there is still no evidence at all that a single person was beaten, nor has the name of a single person who was arrested been provided. That makes three distortions for the reader in just 14 words. Sadly,  the article doesn’t get any more accurate as we read through it. 

The first line can best be described as inflammatory, any reader will immediately feel some degree of disgust against China – which may very well be the entire reason the editors allowed it to go though. It says: “Hundreds of Tibetans protesting against a Chinese dam were rounded up in a harsh crackdown earlier this year, with some beaten and seriously injured”. The next line says: “Such protests are extremely rare in Tibet”

What’s wrong with these 31 words? First of all, the incident happened in Sichuan, not in Tibet but by linking the comment about protests being rare in Tibet, they also intimate that the event happened there – this is important for what comes next because, as the BBC erroneously points out later, Tibet is restricted to foreign journalists. That means, they can now suggest that it’s impossible to gather information on this story. 

But it isn’t, this is another point of misinformation. While Tibet is restricted to all foreigners, not specifically journalists, no one is banned from going there, we just need to go with a tour group. What the BBC fails to mention however, is that in China, they have Chinese staff, those people are not restricted from visiting Tibet at all or they can employ Chinese freelancers, and those people are not restricted either. 

Instead they did not, they got their information, and this is not a joke, from sources who: “live outside of China and are not associated with activist groups. But they did not wish to be named for safety reasons.”

Sources who live outside China, really! Anonymous sources, really! Sources who live outside of China who fear for their safety!!!  Oh come on, just how powerful are the Chinese who the BBC also regularly report as being on the verge of collapse?  

To support this wild allegation of a Tibetan incident which didn’t even happen in Tibet, the BBC claims it has  videos verified by an organisation called, and again, I’m not joking here; “BBC Verify”

What exactly did BBC Verify actually verify, if we read carefully, this is how it’s worded: “the BBC has spent months tracking down Tibetan sources whose family and friends were detained and beaten. BBC Verify has also examined satellite imagery and verified leaked videos which show mass protests and monks begging the authorities for mercy.

Let me re-read that: BBC verify has examined satellite imagery – well, that’s good but what did that verify? Nothing, they have examined satellite imagery, which isn’t part of this report of beatings and or arrests. However, the cleverly worded sentence has us believing that there’s some kind of verification of the arrests or beatings but there isn’t, there are only verifications that “leaked videos” show mass protests and monks begging the authorities.

No arrest is verified, no beating is verified, no location is verified, that’s left for informed readers who understand the difference between the Tibetan Autonomous Region (Xizang, or Tibet) and a Tibetan Autonomous County in Sichuan – the BBC are misinforming by omission here.

No arrest is verified, no beating is verified, no location is verified, that’s left for informed readers who understand the difference between the Tibetan Autonomous Region (Xizang, or Tibet) and a Tibetan Autonomous County in Sichuan – the BBC are misinforming by omission here. BBC Verify, if we read carefully what the words actually say has simply verified that there were some videos of mass protests and some monks were begging authorities for something, but we can’t hear, see or even know what it was the monks were begging for. BBC Verify can’t even verify that the anonymous sources who live outside of China are verified sources. 

One video lasts for 18 seconds and, although there were definitely some monks and other people kneeling and pleading, there is no evidence offered whatsoever about what they were pleading for. So, they’ve verified that there is a video of monks pleading; nothing more. 

A further 28 second video is offered and in this video we can see some people, captioned by the BBC as “hundreds of Tibetan Protestors call for an end to evictions”. The video does indeed show a lot of people, most of whom are simply standing around observing, many are using phone cameras which, unfortunately for the BBC, this just proves to the world that there’s nothing illegal going on. In fact, there’s a short moment when a police officer puts his head into the frame and then walks away.

This 28 seconds has several layers of misinformation – we don’t know if they’re Tibetans but some do appear to be protesting and, if they are protesting, they’re protesting against people using their own language, not Mandarin therefore, if they are Tibetans and there’s no reason to suggest they are not, they aren’t protesting against Han Chinese or they’d be doing that in Mandarin. The language of the nation in which they live – before anyone jumps on this comment and says China invaded Tibet, we won’t get into an argument about whether that’s right or wrong because it’s moot, this event isn’t in Tibet. It’s in Sichuan. Mandarin is a language that all Tibetans can speak; I know, I’ve been there. And, as the BBC often reminds us, all Tibetans are “forced” to learn it at school. Tibetans, Mongolians, Tajiks, Kazakhs, Uyghurs and every other minority in China can speak Mandarin, but more importantly, every person in Sichuan can do so too.

So now we know, they are arguing with people from their own ethnicity, otherwise they’d be using Mandarin, secondly, there are not hundreds in the video, perhaps one hundred, to be very generous and save the time of counting, there might be 150 of them and strangely, on viewing this video several times, it’s noticeable that most of them are not protesting but observing. Thirdly, clearly there are no issues with filming it because the police officer is not in the least bit concerned and finally, as my wife asked when I showed it to her, why is it so dark? Are the BBC up to their old tricks again of reducing the light to make the video appear more sinister, more secretive, or simply more grainy to literally show China in a bad light – I’ve visited Sichuan, and in fact even visited this region in winter, the sky is extremely clear and the sun is extremely bright, it’s very easy to get sunburnt there, even in winter. Yet the BBC continually shows China as dark and murky.

The BBC states they contacted the Chinese Embassy in the UK but they “did not confirm nor deny the protests or the ensuing crackdown.” A highly disingenuous way of saying the Embassy had nothing to say about it. Perhaps a quotation from the embassy would have provided a modicum of credibility. It leaves critical readers wondering what the Embassy did actually say. In a feeble attempt at counter balance the quotation the BBC did provide from the Embassy was this: “China is a country governed by the rule of law, and strictly safeguards citizens’ rights to lawfully express their concerns and provide opinions or suggestions.”

Xi Jinping’s doctoral thesis supervisor Dr Sun Liping, who is an expert on this topic, suggests there are as many as 180,000 protests a year**

Having lived in China for over 20 years, I can attest that this is true but don’t listen to my personal experience, Xi Jinping’s doctoral thesis supervisor Dr Sun Liping, who is an expert on this topic, suggests there are as many as 180,000 protests a year** in China. We’re not seeing that reported in Western media because, as he states, China listens, reviews and acts where necessary maintain social harmony and the fact that so many protests result in positive outcomes is very bad for the BBC’s narrative.

The fact that the BBC want us to believe that this event, involving Tibetans in a Tibetan Autonomous County happened in Tibet is not a mistake, it’s an act of deliberate misinformation and here’s how we know. At any time in the 10 months between the incident happening and the article being published, the BBC could have sent an entire team of foreign investigators into Sichuan quite freely and with no restrictions. They didn’t and why they didn’t must raise a huge question about the integrity and motivations of the BBC, surely their local team would have been consulted and known that Sichuan has no restrictions on travel.

Another strange quirk of BBC journalism is that this event happened in February and was widely reported and shared on X*** yet, without a single item of provable, verifiable or cross checked evidence being added to these allegations, the matter is being raised again. 

Protests anywhere in the world are normal whenever any environmental issue is at stake, China is no different, the videos I saw, which were watched by thousands, showed absolutely no one getting beaten, there were some police moving some monks on, a bit of pushing and pulling, no overt aggression was visible. So it’s very interesting that the BBC have raised this now and it must question their motivations if they see fit to revisit a 10 month old story, no new videos have surfaced, therefore there isn’t a single shred of further information. Why now, why pretend it’s in Tibet, why talk of a crackdown, police beatings or arrests when there’s no evidence of any being presented? 

Let’s talk about the beatings. Despite saying they have evidence of “beatings”, they posted two videos in the links but no videos of any beatings and this begs the question of why not. If they had them, surely they would be shown, this is after all the entire premise of the story and would have added some credibility but no, somehow the beatings all took place off camera and some, according to anonymous sources, even happened in police stations to people as old as 70. Without a single name being offered up as evidence, without a single person being sought by local journalists and without a single report from a hospital or doctor to verify that a person was indeed beaten. Surely the BBC is being remiss here, even a redacted medical report could have been presented but no.

In what appears to be a nod to the veracity of the videos that were posted on X in February, the BBC reports: “One unverified but widely shared clip appears to show Chinese policemen shoving a group of monks on a road, in what is thought to be an arrest operation.”

Look at these words” unverified, appears” and “What is thought to be” this is not evidence, this is laughable and any editor worth his or her salt should throw this out, yet the BBC persists with it. This unverified video showed no beatings, no brutality, no one bearing arms, no one getting shot or shot at, but somehow makes a bigger splash in the newsroom than real protests against genuine oppression and genocide in other countries where the BBC does actually have a presence.

Moving on from the protests to the issue, which is clearly important to a lot of people, there are protests all over the world against dams being built, this is not a particularly Chinese thing but here’s the real spoiler in this story; as the Beeb points out and I quote again from the article: The BBC has been monitoring the valley via satellite imagery for months. For now, there is no sign of the dam’s construction nor demolition of the villages and monasteries.

Let’s stop and think about this for a moment because the BBC generously points out that the Chinese government have visited the region and talked with locals about their concerns they even go on to quote the Chinese embassy as saying: authorities were still conducting geological surveys and specialised studies to build the dam. They added the local government is “actively and thoroughly understanding the demands and aspirations” of residents.”

So, the local government, which proposed this dam in 2012, that’s 12 years ago, is still engaged in scientific studies, surveys and consultations with locals. More than $60 million dollars have been spent to date, according to the Embassy and the work, according to the BBC has not even started yet. 

There have, according to the article, been relocations of some people, relocations of important relics and long running consultations according to none other than the Permanent Mission of the People’s Republic of China to the United Nations office.

So, the United Nations is aware of this, the Chinese government is being transparent has provided evidence to the UN has spent 12 years investigating the scientific, geological and social impacts of this dam but the BBC has unverified videos, provided by anonymous sources which they claim are more believable, this really is unbelievable!

Now, I’m going to get a little bit personal and share some of my experience in two different places. 

One of them is Tibet, where, according to this BBC article, a human rights report has declared that 930,000 Tibetans have been relocated, the other is Hunan, where I witnessed the commencement of construction of a dam in a valley and got to talk with several people in the valley about what was happening to them.

Let’s consider what happened in Hunan first as this was a very similar story, many people were being relocated by the government and I wanted to find out what they were feeling. 

The vast majority of them were ecstatic about it, but of course there were some people who didn’t want it – they were mostly older people.

The BBC, in it’s Tibetan article, says that people were not consulted, a journalist travelling into the region can probably find some people who feel they were not, we certainly did, I was with Xinhua Media Group, they asked me to choose who we talked to, rather than just talk with the people we’d been introduced to. I did, they interviewed everyone I selected and we’ll come back to that in a moment.

The BBC reported that their anonymous sources said “no information was given in the Tibetan language” and, without having evidence to the contrary, it’s hard to refute that but based on my experience in Hunan, this is appears to be an absurd claim. 

First of all, in the BBC’s story, the entire county is run by Tibetans, that’s why it’s called an autonomous county, all the information would have been in dual languages, Tibetan and Mandarin it always is, every government office, every road sign, every official document emanating from the government is in dual languages, there are even subtitles on every TV show and news media in local as well as national language in every autonomous region in the country. 

My personal experience of what happens in events such as this are as follows: we met people who were so inundated with information they were ignoring it. It was in letters to the home, emails to the computers, text messages on their phone, public announcement on village audio systems and notices on notice boards, if anything, people were “over-informed” and  this in itself could be a criticism levelled at China, they are very good at over informing, so good that people stop listening and miss important information.

Every person affected was consulted, they were given an offer for their homes, which they all apart from one, accepted. They were relocated, free of charge to another place higher up the valley or in some cases, they got apartments in the city nearby, because they get the same amount of floorspace as they left, if they left a large home in the valley, they might get two, or even three apartments in the city, it was a choice. But here’s the most amazing thing, they also got a guaranteed 70 years income for the family, this didn’t stop if the person negotiating the deal passed away, this would continue for the full 70 years  because they’ve given the land back to the country. 100% of these people were rural farmers, they and their family were going to get the same income from not working, for the next 70 years as they had for actually working the land in the preceding years, they were going to get free apartments or houses on the hill (a place the government had also built a new road to) and they were going to sell the homes they left for market value. Literally, this is money for nothing.

There were of course some complaints, some older people who didn’t want to move and there was an environmental concern with some rare birds that nested and one resident went viral on Chinese social media complaining about how this would affect the birds – that one person, and the birds, delayed the entire project by four years and only revised his position when there was a flood and four people died downriver, the dam would have prevented their deaths so he accepted the solution of a Beijing ornithologist helping to relocate the birds; after his objections had been resolved, the plan went ahead and Xinhua were there to record it all with me to witness it.

The final experience I have of visiting a rural part of Xizang (Tibet) is that many people there have indeed been relocated and they are living in very nice, in fact, beautiful, modern homes, each home has a garden, a yard, several rooms, full utilities and no need to chop wood to keep warm in the bitterly cold winters they have there. 

Life got a lot better but, human rights groups, who have never visited the Region, using anonymous sources and witnesses outside of Tibet seem to think that this was some kind of imposition – having been into and enjoyed the hospitality of these homes, I beg to differ. Life in Tibet got a whole lot better for a large number of people.

These homes were built 100% free for the residents, but they had to decorate them themselves. They moved out of buildings made with dung, adobe, timber or rock in the mountains and forests and into these new towns with modern appliances, most of them had cars, or at least motorbikes and trailers in the yard. Life got a lot better but, human rights groups, who have never visited the Region, using anonymous sources and witnesses outside of Tibet seem to think that this was some kind of imposition – having been into and enjoyed the hospitality of these homes, I beg to differ. Life in Tibet got a whole lot better for a large number of people.

If indeed 930,000 people have been relocated, there were probably 929,990 people who were very happy about it. Of course some people don’t want change but the best way to find out if they are happy or unhappy about this is to come to China, visit the Region and do what I did – ask them.

And the BBC, if they really wanted to, could do that very easily, if this had happened in Tibet, they could have sent journalists in a tour group, they could have employed freelancers or they could have used their own Chinese staff who have no restrictions whatsoever on travelling anywhere in Tibet. Even for this story, which wasn’t in Tibet, they chose to misinform us into believing that they can’t get proper information because the Chinese government restricts them. 

It’s a great inconvenience to the BBC narrative to know the truth because by knowing the truth, they cannot reasonably deny the lies and there is no doubt in my mind at all, that these are lies. 

* https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c1d37zg1549o

** https://www.scmp.com/news/china/article/1072407/environmental-protests-china-rise-expert-says

*** https://x.com/Lhatseri/status/1761654454905143420