The U.K. has revoked the broadcasting license of China’s state-owned TV channel after an investigation found the license holder lacked editorial control and had links to China’s ruling Communist Party.
| 04 February 2021
Following sanctions on the channel in 2020 for failing to preserve due impartiality and a breach of fairness and privacy rules, UK broadcast regulator Ofcom has withdrawn the licence for China Global Television Network (CGTN) to broadcast in the UK.
In the UK, broadcasting laws state that broadcast licensees must have control over the licensed service – including editorial oversight over the programmes they show. In addition, under these laws, licence holders cannot be controlled by political bodies. Ofcom says that after an investigation of the activities of the international English-language satellite news channel, it concluded that CGTN’s licence is wrongfully held by Star China Media Limited which did not meet the legal requirement of having control over the licensed service, and so was not a lawful broadcast licensee.
U.K. Strips Chinese Broadcaster s License, Citing Communist Party Ties
at 11:10 am NPR
The U.K. s Office of Communications revoked a Chinese media company s right to broadcast Thursday, after finding that the license holder had no editorial control over the state-owned China Global Television Network. The agency says the Chinese Communist Party is ultimately in charge of the satellite news channel.
The regulator, commonly known as Ofcom, says there are two main problems with Star China Media Limited, which holds the license for the English-language China Global Television Network, or CGTN.
First, the company has no editorial oversight over the programs on the channel â a violation of U.K. broadcasting laws. Because of that, Ofcom says, SCML was acting as a distributor, not as a content provider.