It's been made clear by a leading Chinese financial newspaper
that they're fully backing two of their reporters who've been sued
for 30 million yuan (US$3.75 million) --a sum it would take an
average journalist about 600 years to earn--in a defamation case
filed by a Shenzhen iPod manufacturer.
All assets of the duo have been frozen by the Shenzhen
Intermediate People's Court pending a hearing of the suit filed by
Hongfujin Precision Industry Co, the wholly-owned subsidiary of
Foxconn Technology Group, which does original equipment
manufacturing for Apple Inc.
Shanghai-based China Business News said on Sunday the
entire national press would "condemn" the "organized challenge" to
individual reporters and warned the company to withdraw the case or
face legal action.
Yesterday a spokesperson for Foxconn told China Daily
that there were no new developments in the case and it would not
comment further.
Here's how events unfolded:
On June 15, China Business News published a story by
Wang You, describing the alleged harsh working conditions and low
pay in the Taiwan-funded company. According to the report,
employees in the company had to work standing for up to 12 hours a
day.
Within a week Foxconn held a press conference denying the
allegations and invited journalists to check for themselves the
actual working and living conditions in the company.
On June 30, two of the company's representatives are reported to
have complained to Wang and Weng Bao, the former's supervisor, that
the stories cast a negative light on Foxconn and asked them to stop
writing such reports.
On July 4, the company filed a suit in the Shenzhen court
claiming the reports were contrary to fact, misleading, damaged the
image of the company and caused great losses. The suit demanded
Wang pay 20 million yuan (US$2.5 million) in compensation and Weng,
10 million yuan (US$1.25 million).
On July 10, the court ordered the assets of the two journalists
including real estate, automobiles and banking deposits be frozen.
No date has been set for a hearing.
On August 17, Apple announced what it called were the results of
a 10-week investigation of Foxconn and mostly exonerated the
company of the charges made in the media.
Weng told China Daily yesterday that the newspaper made
the public statement in support of its staff after "repeated
attempts" to seek negotiation with the company failed.
Yang Baiguo, the newspaper's spokesman, told China
Daily that neither of the journalists had received any
subpoenas or summons from the court.
Xu Xun, legal consultant of China National Radio, said the
Chinese Supreme Court made a ruling in 1993 stating that individual
reporters couldn't be named as defendants in such lawsuits and only
their employers could.
"The two reporters should have had little to worry about but
they do have big headaches now," said Xu.
Zhao Chenyu, Party secretary of the All-China Journalists'
Association, told China Daily that her association would
get involved if the two journalists or their newspaper approached
the organization.
(China Daily August 29, 2006)