Bridging News Opens Office at Brazilian Press Association

On November 8, 2024, the Brazilian Press Association (巴西新聞協會), or ABI, signed a strategic cooperation agreement in São Paulo with Chongqing’s Western International Communication Center (西部國際傳播中心), or WICC, to set up a Bridging News Brazil Liaison Office. The agreement was reported by Forum Macao (中國—葡語國家經貿合作論壇), a Macau-based platform backed by the Chinese government, citing the ABI. Bridging News is one of the WICC’s international platforms. The WICC is run by the Chongqing Daily News Group (重慶日報報業集團) under the guidance of the municipality’s propaganda office, and it was China’s first provincial-level international communication center, or ICC. ICCs are local and regional hubs created under Xi Jinping’s push since 2018 to reinvent China’s international communication, which the Chinese Communist Party still calls “external propaganda” (對外宣傳). They repurpose local propaganda content for foreign audiences. ABI Director of Journalism Moacyr de Oliveira Filho and WICC Director Zhao Wujun signed the agreement at an event promoting Chongqing brands in Brazil. According to the report, the office will promote Chongqing’s brands in Brazil and Latin America and support financial news reporting and services for Chinese companies seeking to expand in Brazil. The agreement came two months after the ABI joined the International Home of Journalists (國際記者之家), a network run by the official All-China Journalists Association (中華全國新聞工作者協會), or ACJA, a Chinese Communist Party-led professional association that serves a key role in implementing press control policies.