In the global catastrophe caused by the novel coronavirus, the first responsibility that must be questioned is that of the Chinese Communist Party. Yet NHK’s Watch 9 avoids confronting China’s concealment and propaganda, instead featuring commentators such as Ian Bremmer and shifting the focus toward criticism of President Trump. This essay examines the abnormality of NHK’s reporting while referring to TV Tokyo WBS coverage of China’s fabricated footage, the false “Chinese national anthem” story in Italy, and Chinese consular propaganda aimed at Wisconsin.

May 6, 2020

It is because they continue to see no evil, hear no evil, and speak no evil toward a fact that even an elementary school student can understand: that this catastrophe originated from China’s Wuhan virus research institute.

Few Japanese citizens would object to the view that NHK is, in substance, Japan’s state-run broadcasting station.
Few Japanese citizens would also object to the view that Watch 9, its news program, is one of NHK’s principal news programs.
Now, the world is being struck by the greatest catastrophe since the end of the war.
Yet what is extremely strange about the response of Japan’s media and some Japanese politicians is that,
toward a fact that even an elementary school student can understand, namely that this catastrophe originated from China’s Wuhan virus research institute, they continue to see no evil, hear no evil, and speak no evil.
This is not only Japan’s problem.
For some reason, there are countless pro-China politicians and scholars throughout the world.
Yet when speaking about this catastrophe, the president of NHK gives a man like Arima a position like that of a judge, and leaves the selection of speakers to his arbitrary judgment.
Whenever something happens, he drags out a young man such as Ian Bremmer.
This Ian Bremmer is probably a supporter of the Democratic Party and one of the leading anti-Trump figures.
Many discerning people must remember that, when Trump was elected, he appeared at NHK’s request and commented with a face as if the world had come to an end.
I would like to say this to Maeda, the current president of NHK.
But since he, too, is probably one of the children of the Asahi Shimbun, raised by reading that newspaper, it would be meaningless.
Therefore, I want to say this to the Japanese people.
If NHK is, in substance, Japan’s state-run broadcasting station, and if it truly wants to have people speak about the future world, is it not its duty to connect at least the leaders of the G6 online, or to connect with them one by one and interview them, and then report this to the Japanese people?
How long does NHK intend to allow such arbitrary conduct, letting a man like Arima select someone like Ian Bremmer and have him speak?
NHK is always saying, is it not, that it is a public broadcaster.
Then how can Arima, who is nothing more than an employee, arbitrarily use a private individual who is merely a supporter of the U.S. Democratic Party and one of the standard-bearers of anti-Trump opinion,
and have him speak at length about such foolishness as “the individual rather than the state,” something that would delight the foolish politicians of the Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan?
We must no longer allow such an attempt to brainwash the Japanese people.
If NHK is Japan’s state-run broadcaster, then what it should do first is ask the prime ministers and presidents of the G6 in the manner described above.
This is, of course, on the premise that NHK insists on seeking opinions from others, from people in other countries.
For Arima and Ian Bremmer, who are absolutely nothing in this context, to speak about the future world on the principal news program of Japan’s state-run broadcaster is an entirely abnormal posture.
From the standpoint of the public broadcasting they constantly invoke, it is something that should never be allowed.
It is elementary-school level common sense that NHK should first ask Macron, Merkel, Johnson, Shinzo Abe, Trudeau, and Trump.
Above all, what is worst about Arima and Bremmer is that they have absolutely no perspective on the legitimacy of the Chinese Communist Party’s dictatorial regime, or on how long that regime will continue.
They have no perspective on whether it might possibly collapse within the next few years.
What exactly was this Wuhan virus?
Why did it become such a catastrophe?
Above all, they have no perspective that China bears responsibility.
China itself is desperately spreading false propaganda so that it will not be sued for damages by the entire world for its own grave errors, which is surely what they would be doing,
and the posture of these two men is the other side of the same coin.
Among the people now appearing as commentators on television news programs, the only truly decent person is Mr. Takita of TV Tokyo’s WBS.
That is probably because he is one of the very few people who has not been caught in China’s honey traps or South Korea’s money traps and honey traps.
He alone shows no deference toward China.
Last night, Mr. Takita reported that China’s lies were beginning to become an issue in Europe and the United States, and he aired two examples.
The first footage was something I had never seen before.
When China sent a medical team to Italy, the news footage China distributed to the world was fabricated.
It showed residents of an Italian city leaning out from their balconies, expressing gratitude to China and singing the Chinese national anthem.
That news footage was entirely fabricated.
The second example was the outrageous propaganda case involving the Chinese consul general in Michigan and the speaker of the Wisconsin State Assembly.
It was a scoop by a Financial Times reporter, which this column introduced on the very day it appeared in the Nikkei Shimbun.
The background behind Arima dragging out Ian Bremmer and running toward an outrageous arbitrary use of the public airwaves must have been an urgent need to conceal, for China’s sake, the facts revealed by Mr. Takita of Nikkei.
Ian Bremmer is probably a man with the same circumstances as Arima.
Of course, tonight’s Watch 9 will not report at all the footage that WBS reported last night, and it has still not reported at all the Wisconsin case.
What it does report, day after day, is only the line that President Trump is attacking China over the Wuhan virus because of calculations related to the presidential election.
That is the line of China, that is, the CCP.
In other words, it is reporting exactly in accordance with the guidance documents from CCTV, which was once inside NHK’s headquarters, and from the Chinese Embassy in Moto-Azabu.
That alone it continues to do, day after day.
The fabricated Chinese footage set in an Italian city, which WBS reported last night, was the first time I had seen this news reported in the newspapers I subscribe to or on the television programs I watch.
In the following article, which I found by searching the Internet a little while ago, the footage and its content are described.
This footage with sound reminded me of the fabricated footage produced by South Korea at the time of the South Korean military radar irradiation incident several years ago.
China, the Great China, and South Korea, the Little China, perfectly prove that they are countries of bottomless evil and plausible lies.
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Has the Chinese Foreign Ministry Spread Fake News?
“The Chinese National Anthem Played in Italy and Gratitude to China” Was a Fabrication, Italian Media Say
Regarding the CCP virus, also called the novel coronavirus, the Chinese government has intensified its information manipulation.
Multiple Italian media outlets pointed out that the story told by a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson, namely that “Italians sang the Chinese national anthem in gratitude for China’s support with medical resources,” was fabricated.
On March 15, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying, citing a report by the People’s Daily, wrote on Twitter:
“The Chinese national anthem is being sung in Rome. Italians shouted, ‘Thank you, China.’ We are companions who share hardship and joy.”
Zhao Lijian, who had newly become spokesperson in February, also attached footage from inside Italy and made a similar tweet.
The Italian media outlet Money.it analyzed the video and pointed out that the people standing on the balconies had not said the words in question, and that although they were applauding, the Chinese national anthem had been added later through editing.
The local media outlet Linkiesta also quoted the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson’s post and reported:
“Italian Foreign Minister and other cabinet ministers must make China stop spreading fake news.”
In an editorial, Il Foglio stated that China had recently been urging Italy to make additional purchases of masks and ventilators.
Furthermore, regarding China’s plan to send experts who had handled the early stage of the outbreak, it pointed out that this was “political propaganda,” and that,
“This is Beijing’s propaganda, the export of a ‘Chinese global model’ for fighting infectious disease.”
The Chinese Communist Party regime has been spreading, on overseas social media sites and in the media, the theory that the origin of the virus is unknown and the theory praising China’s response.
Regarding this, even the American left-leaning media outlet CNN reported:
“The Chinese government has launched a propaganda campaign to cast doubt on the origin of the CCP virus, which has infected tens of thousands of people.”
On the 12th, spokesperson Zhao Lijian wrote on Twitter:
“The outbreak of the CCP virus may not necessarily have originated in China.”
“It was brought in by the U.S. military. The United States has an obligation to explain.”
In response, Republican U.S. lawmakers criticized Zhao as a “clown” and dismissed the theory that the U.S. military had brought in the virus.
On the 17th, U.S. President Trump used the expression “Chinese virus” when he said:
“The United States will strongly support airlines and other companies affected by the ‘Chinese virus.’”
Secretary of State Pompeo also clearly stated that he would call it the “Wuhan virus,” rather than COVID-19, a term from which the origin cannot be known by words alone.
Translation and editing by Michiyo Sado
The following are comments in response.
I am astonished by this terribly cheap video.
There is no way that sound could have been recorded live with that footage.
It is the lowest kind of fake.
The Italian government is being manipulated by the Chinese Communist Party as it pleases.
Can it not even say what needs to be said?
Even after seeing this propaganda, can they still not understand that the Chinese Communist Party and the Nazis belong in the same category?
Sorry.
A Nazi sympathizer told me not to equate them with such people.
Certainly, the Nazis were more decent.
The CCP is not human, but evil itself.
The only man who can fight the CCP is President Trump.
China has many great fools at the top.
And there are not a few small fools as well.