Skip to main content

Activity Category: Media Engagement Activity

2022 Cross-Strait Chinese Character Festival Held in Taipei

Written by Editors on .

The 2022 Cross-Strait Chinese Character Festival (海峽兩岸漢字節) culminating event was held in Taipei on December 14, 2022. The festival was organized on the mainland side by the Haicang District Propaganda Office of the Chinese Communist Party (中共海滄區委宣傳部), the Haicang District Federation of Literary and Art Circles (海滄區文學藝術界聯合會), and the state-run Xiamen Daily (廈門日報社), published by the CCP Committee in Xiamen, with Taiwan’s Want Want China Times Media Group (旺旺中時傳媒集團) serving as the Taiwan co-organizer. The annual character — “thought/longing” (思) — was announced at the Taipei ceremony, selected from more than 14.7 million votes. Excellence Magazine (卓越雜誌) president Xu Banghao (徐邦浩) participated and the magazine partnered with organizers to publish a companion volume in Taiwan. The festival, established in 2008 and anchored in Haicang since 2014, has been described by organizers as a platform for advancing cross-strait “emotional convergence” (心靈契合). The phrase originates with Chinese leader Xi Jinping, who introduced it in 2014 as a central concept in his unification framework, describing the goal of unification as not merely formal but requiring that compatriots on both sides achieve a deeper spiritual and emotional alignment — a formulation that People’s Daily has since elaborated as the ideological basis for using cultural exchange to build Taiwan public acceptance of unification.

Want Want China Times Media Group and Beijing Daily Group Sign Strategic Cooperation Agreement

Written by Editors on .

Want Want China Times Media Group (旺旺中時媒體集團) and Beijing Daily Group (北京日報報業集團) signed a strategic cooperation agreement (戰略合作協議) in late 2014. The agreement established a framework for news exchange and media industry cooperation between the two groups, and provided the organizational basis for the annual Cross-Strait Media Summit (兩岸媒體人北京峰會), a joint media platform the two groups subsequently developed together. The existence of the agreement was reported by The News Lens in 2019, citing China Times coverage of subsequent summit activity.

Want Want China Times Media Group Chairman Meets CPPCC Chairman Wang Yang in Beijing

Written by Editors on .

Want Want Holdings (旺旺集團) and Want Want China Times Media Group (旺旺中時媒體集團) chairman Tsai Eng-meng (蔡衍明) led a delegation to Beijing in July 2018, visiting several Chinese state media organizations and meeting with Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) chairman Wang Yang (汪洋), a Politburo Standing Committee member and one of the six most senior officials in the CCP hierarchy. The visit was reported by CitiOrange in an April 2019 investigation citing a Reporters Without Borders report on Chinese media expansion. Wang Yang subsequently referenced his meeting with Tsai at the Fourth Cross-Strait Media Summit in May 2019, recounting that Tsai had told him that maintaining the 1992 Consensus position was making his situation very difficult.

Taiwan’s Excellence Media Leads Delegation to Xiamen

Written by Editors on .

A delegation of ten Taiwan entrepreneurs led by Xu Banghao (徐邦浩), president of Taiwan’s Excellence Global Media Corporation (卓越全球傳媒股份有限公司), visited Xiamen on August 19–20, 2024, touring cross-strait entrepreneur incubator facilities including Qida Taixiang (啟達台享) and the Haixi MCN Cross-Strait Youth Base (海西MCN兩岸青年三創基地). The base was established in November 2022 under the direction of the Huli District Taiwan-Hong Kong-Macau Affairs Office (湖里區台港澳辦) as an incubator for Taiwan youth in e-commerce and livestreaming, reported at its founding by the Party’s official People’s Daily. A July 2025 Fujian Daily article subsequently identified the base as a component of Xiamen’s state-directed cross-strait integration strategy, explicitly linking it to goals of advancing Taiwan compatriots’ “ethnic, cultural, and national identity” (民族認同、文化認同、國家認同) with the mainland. The delegation also visited the Huli District Administrative Services Center (湖里區行政服務中心), where members applied for PRC mainland resident permits (居住證). The visit was reported by the Straits Herald (海峽導報), a Fujian-based CCP-directed newspaper. According to an April 2024 report from People’s Daily Online, the MCN initiative is a state-guided project managed by the Huli District Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macao Affairs Office (湖里区委台港澳办) and the Huli District Committee Organization Department (湖里区委组织部) alongside the local United Front Work Department (湖里区委统战部), whose role, according to the report, is to facilitate “national conditions” (国情) training — a reference to ideological and patriotic education — through economic and digital media incentives. 

2018 China-Latin America Media Forum

Written by Editors on .

The 2018 China-Latin America Media Forum took place in Buenos Aires, Argentina on November 19, 2018, focusing on “Deepening Media Cooperation to Help Build a China-Latin America Community with a Shared Future,” according to Xinhua News Agency. Representatives discussed media’s role in bilateral cooperation and new media platforms. Xinhua reported that a Brazilian representative from a financial information group claimed that media plays an “incomparable role” in cooperation, allowing audiences to receive “first-hand information” rather than filtered news from Europe and the United States, language that closely mirrors Chinese state media talking points about Western media bias—as reported by Xinhua. Alejandro Ramos Esquivel (亞歷杭德羅·拉莫斯·埃斯基維爾), who served as Notimex’s Director-General from 2013-2018, reportedly stated the forum brought together diverse media organizations to analyze cooperation trends, predicting collaboration would “flourish” as China’s “Belt and Road Initiative” gains influence. The event highlighted opportunities in website development and capacity building.

Third China-Australia Media Forum Held in Sydney

Written by Editors on .

The Third China-Australia Media Forum (第三屆中澳媒體論壇) was held in Sydney on August 25, 2014, jointly organized by China’s State Council Information Office (中國國務院新聞辦公室) and Australian News Channel Pty Ltd (澳大利亞新聞頻道股份有限公司). Over 50 government and media representatives from both countries discussed topics including economic cooperation, reporting, and media exchange mechanisms under the theme “Media’s Role in Building Stable China-Australia Relations.” Cai Mingzhao (蔡名照), then-director of China’s State Council Information Office, delivered a keynote speech emphasizing the media’s role in fostering bilateral understanding and proposing three recommendations for strengthening cooperation. Paul Fletcher, representing Australia’s Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull, noted the forum provided “a valuable platform” for media exchange. Chinese state media reported that “both sides agreed media exchanges are increasingly close and should continue playing a constructive role in deepening bilateral relations.” The forum, established in April 2006, alternates annually between the two countries.

SBS Australia Signs Deal With Chinese State Broadcaster

Written by Editors on .

SBS Australia struck an agreement with the CCP-run media conglomerate China Media Group (中央广播电视总台), or CMG, in March 2018, to broadcast news bulletins on its SBS World Watch channel, including 30-minute Mandarin-language bulletins from China Central Television (中国中央电视台, CCTV) and 15-minute English-language bulletins from CGTN (中国环球电视网), the broadcaster’s global arm. CMG operates under the Chinese Communist Party’s Central Propaganda Department with the mandate of “propagating the party’s theories, directions, principles and policies” and “telling China’s stories well.” SBS defended the arrangement by stating it clearly identified content sources and would monitor international news services to ensure compliance with its codes of practice, while providing balance through its own locally produced news and SBS Mandarin radio programming. SBS suspended the CGTN and CCTV broadcasts in March 2021 following complaints from Safeguard Defenders alleging the channels had broadcast forced confessions.

Indonesian and Malaysian Journalists Visit Xinjiang

Written by Editors on .

Journalists from Indonesia and Malaysia visited the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region from February 22-27, 2019, as part of the ASEAN Elites China Tour 2019. According to a report by Xinhua News Agency, the group included a senior editor from the Indonesian newspaper Kompas, an assistant editor from the Malaysian newspaper Sinar Harian, the chief editor of the Indonesian digital platform IDN Times, and representatives from Liputan6, Metro TV,  and Antara (Indonesia’s national news agency). The journalists visited what Chinese authorities described as “vocational education and training centers” in the eastern Shule and Hotan County. Participants were quoted describing facilities as having “spacious buildings” and being “well-equipped,” with one journalist quoted by Xinhua saying that it was “not as reported by some news outlets.” Human rights organizations have criticized such government-organized tours as highly controlled and designed to counter international reporting that has documented serious human rights abuses in Xinjiang. International organizations, including the United Nations Human Rights Office, have documented that more than one million Uyghurs and other Muslims have been arbitrarily detained in these facilities since 2017, with torture and other abuses reported by former detainees.

Filipino-Chinese Amity Club Runs Photo Event on WWII Victory

Written by Editors on .

On July 14, 2025, the Filipino-Chinese Amity Club (菲華聯誼總會), a Philippines-based overseas Chinese organization with close ties to China’s United Front Work Department (UFWD), hosted a photo exhibition commemorating the 80th anniversary of victory in the “World Anti-Fascist War” (世界反法西斯戰爭) — the official Chinese Communist Party framing of World War II — at the Philippine Cultural College (菲律賓僑中學院) in Manila. The event was co-organized by the Philippine Association of Descendants of the “Huazhi” (菲律賓「華支」後裔聯誼會), a group representing descendants of the Chinese anti-Japanese resistance in the Philippines, and was reported by China News Service (中國新聞網), an official PRC newswire under the UFWD. Club Chairman Cai Mingfeng (蔡明豐) told attendees that “countless forebears exchanged their lives for today’s dawn of peace,” and called on younger generations to “see the cruelty of war” through the 123 photographs on display. Li Xiangzhao (李向昭), chairman of the Huazhi descendants association, said the exhibition aimed to “take history as a mirror.” The event followed the same organizational template as a similar exhibition held the following month in Angeles City, also organized by the club.