Police turned back a reporter from Britain’s The Guardian after he drove over a mountain pass to enter an Linxia, Gansu province, an area near the border between with Sichuan where protests had taken place.
Reporter Jonathan Watts said an English-speaking officer told him “There is a police action taking place. Foreigners are not allowed inside. These are the orders of high authority.”
He said a Foreign Ministry official told a colleague: “When there is some emergency, the local authority has the power to set up prohibited areas for outsiders. This is for the stability and unity of that province and this country.”