Police of a Chinese county withdrew on Tuesday an official
investigation into a reporter whose article was allegedly a slander
to the county's Communist Party chief after media and citizens
questioned the justice of the move.
The Xifeng County Public Security Bureau had withdrawn the
"improper" investigation decision, the bureau's director Wang
Weidong told Xinhua late Tuesday night.
Zhang Zhiguo, Party chief of Xifeng in northeastern Liaoning
Province, reportedly dispatched police officers to Beijing to
subpoena Zhu Wenna, a female reporter for Faren Magazine for a
story about the county.
Zhu published the story on Jan. 1 this year, saying that Zhang
had ordered the arrest of a woman for libel after she had sent a
sarcastic text message alleging corruption after her gas station
was demolished to make way for a market with meagre
compensation.
More than 14,000 Chinese netizens left comments on the Internet,
denouncing the act of the Xifeng police.
(Xinhua News Agency January 9, 2008)