Two reporters from The Associated Press were covering a temple visit by family members of passengers of the missing Malaysia Airlines flight 370 in the Western Hills Park in western Beijing on June 12 when they encountered police interference and damage to their equipment.
Upon entering the park, a police officer told them they were not allowed to film inside the park. But because the relatives insisted, the police officer let the reporters in with a warning that they could not shoot the hills. The reporters agreed.
When the reporters got closer to the temple inside the park, several men who claimed they were employees of the temple told them they had no permission to film on the grounds of the temple. One of them demanded that the journalists obtain permission from the National Office of Religious Affairs, which would have completely ruined the reporters’ plans to film the family members’ prayer activities.
Two men followed the TV journalist and stopped her from filming with a small camera. They demanded that the memory card be taken out, and when the card was returned, the TV journalist found the card was blocked and could not be used any more. The TV journalist later was separated from the relatives and they found that they could not photograph or film the prayer activity as a result of the interference, even though they had the support of the family members and were in a public park.
This report was filed to the FCCC on June 17, 2014.