方舟子的Blog

中国作调查性报道的记者遭受侵扰，甚至更糟

揭露医疗骗局的北京记者方玄昌，不久前遭到两名持铁管歹徒的袭击。

洛杉矶时报2010年8月21日
记者 John M. Glionna自北京报道

（Yush翻译）

中国的新闻界，就像当年美国混乱的西部，媒体上充斥各种的骗局，从敲诈者假冒记者到真记者以不曝光为由收取报酬。方玄昌正是混乱中出现的一位西部枪手。作为调查性报道的记者，他专于调查医疗欺诈，包括推广神奇疗法的无良医生，以及伪造成果骗取官方奖励的庸医科学家。

在信奉家丑不可外扬且时常偏执的文化氛围中，揭发丑闻的人被视为多管闲事的危险分子。方玄昌就曾经受到来自一些机构的困扰，还曾被威胁起诉、坐牢。而这些天，他在庆幸他还能活着。

六月份，他下班快到家时，遭到两名身体健壮、挥舞铁管的人的袭击。他说，这两人手法专业。他们埋伏在他所住公寓附近没有电视监控的黑暗地点，从背后伏击他。

凶手手法高效，一声不吭，重击他的头和上身，而旁观者对此无动于衷。

财经杂志记者方玄昌说：“他们试图杀掉我。”

37岁的方玄昌身材虽瘦，但身体强壮，而且还懂武术。他一番反击后跑进了一辆出租车，衣服被鲜血浸透。攻击者跑掉了。

警方尚未逮捕凶手。而方玄昌认为，凶手肯定是他所报道揭露的一名医生雇来的。

他的怀疑是有道理的。据保护记者委员会，自1992年以来，中国已经有3名记者殉职，人数远少于有大量记者死亡的俄罗斯和菲律宾。尽管如此，有关人士认为，中国的情况仍不容乐观。

中国受袭击的记者的统计数字极小，然而，据保护记者委员会12月份的调查，中国有24名记者被关在监狱，包括几名网上博客作者。

设在巴黎的记者无国界组织的主编Gilles Lordet说：“对那些令当地政府或有权势的人难堪的记者来说，中国是个危险的地方。”

中国绝大多数媒体受政府严厉控制，网上和报摊见不到批评政府的报道。据一条新的法律，大城市的记者被禁止独立报道全国或国际新闻，而且不得改动中央宣传部提供的信息。

主张言论自由的人士抗议政府针对记者的行为，其中一名记者因为对一家大电池厂所作的负面报道而直接被通缉，另一名则因“危害国家安全”被判处15年徒刑。

方玄昌被袭事件则表明，记者又有了另外的对手：心怀仇恨、雇佣暴徒伺机报复的被报道对象。

这位杭州人追踪学术造假，曝光科研剽窃者和其他伪造专业奖励和证书者。他还曝光了官僚们施加压力，迫使科研人员伪造数据。

政府承认，学术领域腐败盛行。一项由国家资助的研究发现，顶尖科研机构的6000名科研人员中，有三分之一的人承认实施过“剽窃、篡改、伪造”行为。

更有甚者，方玄昌说，是那些在受教育程度不高的公众面前充当神医的医生。“他们为病人制造虚幻的希望，而病人又相信他们说的每件事、愿意花光所有的钱，最终没有治好，反而倾家荡产。”

方玄昌最近调查了一名医生。这名医生声称能医治一种罕见的使病人失去大小便功能的脊椎病，其手术从病人腿上取一段神经接到脊椎上。方玄昌证实，手术不仅不能治好病人，反而危险。

方玄昌说：“这个医生自吹100个病人中有80%的成功率，而我们联系到的70个病人无一受益，三分之一的病人说他们腿脚不灵。”【译注：此段中的数据不精确。神源医院为肖传国出具的申报院士治愈率假证明声称，该院应用肖氏术治疗患者117例，“术后随访8个月以上60例，85％的患者大小便已恢复正常”。而几乎同一时期在神源医院做手术的110位患者，经律师和记者调查的74位患者中无一例成功，其中73%的患者手术无效，39%的患者腿脚有后遗症。】

该医生目前面临多起诉讼。

两名凶手在方玄昌的头上留下两寸长的深长的伤口，缝了五针。此事件促使国营新闻机构发表简短社论，呼吁保护记者免遭伤害。

方玄昌认为这种犯罪攻击更甚于政府对记者的困扰。

他说：“与政府打交道，起码政府有规矩，但来自黑帮的威胁就不同了。”

方玄昌没有被吓住。他又开始了工作，揭露下一场骗局。

方玄昌说：“作为一名中国记者，你不能被这些袭击所困扰，不能向他们低头。”

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-china-reporters-20100822,0,201357.story

China’s investigative reporters face harassment and worse

Beijing reporter Fang Xuanchang tackles medical fraud. Not long ago, two thugs with lead pipes decided to tackle him.

By John M. Glionna, Los Angeles Times
August 21, 2010

Reporting from Beijing —

Fang Xuanchang is a gunslinger in the chaotic Wild West of journalism. And China has it all, from blackmailers posing as media types to legitimate reporters taking kickbacks not to go to print.

Then there’s Fang, an investigative reporter who specializes in medical fraud: unscrupulous doctors promoting miracle cures and quack scientists who fabricate research results for bureaucratic kudos.

In a secretive and often paranoid culture where muckrakers are viewed as dangerous busybodies, Fang has been harassed by authorities and threatened with lawsuits and jail time. These days he considers himself lucky to be alive.

In June, as Fang was arriving home from work, he was set upon by two well-built men wielding lead pipes. It was a professional job, he says. They ambushed him from behind in a shadowy area near his apartment complex, a spot unseen by surveillance cameras.

The assailants worked efficiently, silently flailing away at his head and upper body, unconcerned by bystanders.
“They tried to kill me,” said Fang, an editor at Caijing magazine.
Fang, a slight but physically fit 37-year-old who knows martial arts, fought his way into a taxi, his clothes soaked with, blood. His attackers vanished.

Police have yet to make any arrests, but Fang thinks the men must have been hired by one of the doctors exposed by his stories.

He has reason to be suspicious. Since 1992, three Chinese journalists have been killed on the job, far fewer than in Russia and the Philippines, where scores have died, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists, but still, activists say, China is no place for the squeamish.

Although statistics on attacks on journalists are scarce here, a December survey by the Committee to Protect Journalists showed that 24 Chinese journalists were in prison, including several Internet bloggers.

“For journalists who embarrass local government or otherwise powerful people, China is a very dangerous place,” said Gilles Lordet, chief editor of Paris-based Reporters Without Borders.

In a nation where most news media are heavily controlled by the state, reports critical of the government vanish from the Internet and newsstands. Under a new law, journalists based in metropolitan areas are forbidden to independently report on national or international stories and cannot modify information provided by the Communist Party’s propaganda department.

Free-speech activists have lodged protests over government actions against journalists, including one who was briefly placed on a most-wanted list for his negative story about a major battery manufacturer and another who was sentenced to 15 years in prison for “threatening national security.”

Fang’s case suggests another adversary: vindictive story subjects who hire thugs to exact revenge.

The Hangzhou native has pursued academic fraud, exposing research plagiarists and others who fake professional awards and credentials. He’s also shed light on the pressure bureaucrats exert on researchers to produce fraudulent results.

The government acknowledges that the field is rife with corruption. One state-sponsored study found that among 6,000 scientists at top institutions, a third admitted committing “plagiarism, falsification or fabrication.”

Worse, Fang says, are the doctors who play the role of magic healer to an undereducated public. “They produce false hope in patients willing to pay anything and believe everything,” he said. “In the end, there’s no cure, only financial ruin.”

Fang recently investigated a doctor who claimed he could cure a rare spinal cord condition that leaves patients without bowel control. His procedure takes a nerve from the patient’s leg and moves it to the spinal cord. Fang showed that the operation not only offered no cure, but was dangerous.

“The doctor boasted an 80% success rate with 100 patients,” Fang said, “but none of 70 people we contacted said they were helped. A third said they had lost use of their leg.”

The physician is now the target of numerous lawsuits.

The men who attacked Fang left a 2-inch gash in his skull that took five stitches to close. The incident prompted a brief editorial in the state-run press urging that reporters not be harmed.

Fang calls such criminal attacks worse than party harassment.

“When you deal with the government, at least you know the rules,” he said. “But threats from gangs are different.”

Undeterred, he’s at work on a new expose.

“As a journalist in China, you can’t obsess about attacks,” Fang said, “or you might as well quit.”

john.glionna@latimes.com

Copyright 2010, Los Angeles Times