Chinese journalists punished for wrongly reporting Xi Jinping's 'resignation' in state media spelling mistake
A spelling mistake caused the word 'speech' to appear as 'resignation'
Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.Four Chinese journalists are to be punished after accidentally reporting that President Xi Jinping had resigned because of a typo.
A report filed by the state-owned China News Service covered his address to the China-Africa summit in Johannesburg on Friday.
But in pinyin, the system of writing Mandarin Chinese in Latin characters, the words for “resignation” - ci zhi – and “speech” - zhi ci – are easily confused.
That was the mistake made by the China News Service report on remarks made by Mr Xi in an article reprinted by at least 20 media outlets, according to the Hong Kong-based Information Centre for Human Rights and Democracy.
“Xi Jinping said in his resignation that China and Africa have always shared a common destiny,” the offending paragraph read.
A correction was issued 45 minutes later but the change was too late for several papers and websites that did not notice the error.
Activists said two editors and two reporters from the agency, which is the second-largest in China, had been suspended for “major errors”.
The South China Morning Post reported that, according to an order issued by the Communist Party's propaganda department, major news reports and particularly stories involving state leaders, should always be published using official news agency reports.
The saga came days after Xinhua, the largest state news agency in China, spelled Barack Obama’s name in its Chinese translation of “Ao Ma Ba” in an article on talks between the US President and Mr Xi.
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments