Officials Block Filming Of Farmer

Aug 20, 2008

Officials interrupted filming of a corn farmer in Mancheng, Hebei province by a Sky TV crew that was working on a story about the drought in northern China. Holly Williams said the officials very aggressively told the woman farmer to halt what she was doing and then demanded to see the IDs of the film crew even though they were wearing Olympic IDs. The officials refused to show their own identification, but blocked filming by putting their hands over the camera and on the microphone. They then followed the film crew in a car all the way back to the Beijing city limits.

“It certainly had an impact on our story,” Williams said. “We needed the shot of corn farming, but we couldn’t do it.”