Ofcom, the U.K’s broadcast regulator on Thursday announced it has revoked the license of CGTN, the foreign arm of China Central Television. The move is likely to escalate the tensions in the already controversial relationship of the two countries.
According to Ofcom, the revocation of CGTN’s license in the U.K was done after its investigations revealed that the license is wrongfully held by Star China Media Limited.”
The regulator explained that licensees must have editorial control over the licensed service. Also, license holders cannot be controlled by political bodies. CGTN fell foul on these two counts because editorial control rests with CCTV, which is ultimately controlled by the Communist Party of China, and that Star China Media “is the distributor of the CGTN service in the U.K., rather than the provider of the service.”
Ofcom while offering more explanations said, “In addition, (Ofcom) has been unable to grant an application to transfer the licence to an entity called China Global Television Network Corporation (CGTNC). This is because crucial information was missing from the application and because we consider that CGTNC would be disqualified from holding a license, as it is controlled by a body which is ultimately controlled by the Chinese Communist Party.”
In the past, Ofcom had fallen foul of Ofcom’s Broadcasting Code for failing to preserve due impartiality in its coverage of the Hong Kong protests. These constituted a “serious breach” of the U.K.’s fairness and privacy rules. “We expect to conclude separate sanctions proceedings against CGTN for due impartiality and fairness and privacy breaches shortly,” the Ofcom statement said.
Also, the regulatory body has ongoing fairness and privacy investigations about content on the CGTN service.
For now, the CGTN is yet to comment but it is expected that the U.K move will be met with retaliation which further will worsen the cold relationship between the two countries.
