On Saturday, as protests entered their tenth weekend and demonstrators and police clashed in Hong Kong, the People’s Daily posted an article on the Chinese WeChat webchat service saying members from “all parts of Hong Kong society” were calling for the “violence to stop”. As peaceful rallies at the Hong Kong airport continued over the weekend, Chinese state media posted videos on Weibo of a tussle between demonstrators and an angry resident yelling: “We just want Hong Kong to be safe”.
Other special reports include letters between the Chinese and Hong Kong police applauding “the great bravery” of the Hong Kong police – a main target of the protests. Last week, a journalist with state news agency Xinhua travelled to Hong Kong and described the city as “shrouded in black terror”.
Over the past two months, Chinese state media outlets have gone from near silence on the protests and blanket censorship of footage of the demonstrations to actively pushing news, editorials, videos and online discussions.
“The mainland media can’t be seen as journalism. It’s purely propaganda… It is intercepting a small part of the information, distorting it and magnifying it,” said Fang Kecheng, a professor at Chinese University of Hong Kong, specialising in communications.
In Chinese state media the demonstrations, most of which have been peaceful, are routinely described as “riots”. Daily coverage show footage of protesters hurling bricks, jeering at police, and surrounding police stations. The protesters are described as “radicals” and “thugs” seeking to topple the entire system through independence for the city, a former British colony now under Chinese sovereignty.