China Global Television Network (CGTN) is one of three branches of state-run China Media Group and the international division of China Central Television (CCTV). Headquartered in Beijing, CGTN broadcasts news in multiple languages. CGTN is under the control of the Publicity Department of the Chinese Communist Party.
Several media regulators and journalist advocacy groups have accused CGTN of broadcasting propaganda and disinformation on behalf of the Chinese government, and airing forced confessions.
History CGTN grew out of CCTV's all-English channel, known as CCTV-9 or CCTV International, launched in 2000 and renamed CCTV News in 2010. Channels in other languages were launched during the mid and late 2000s. On 1 January 2017, the six non-Chinese language television channels under CCTV International were rebranded to bear the CGTN name. In 2018, CGTN was brought under the umbrella of the China Media Group. By 2022, CGTN had built a network of social media influencers, according to the Associated Press.
Launching CGTN was intended to create a global outlet expressing Chinese government perspectives on global news, with the idea that it could compete in a niche similar to BBC or CNN. Observers have noted that the "aim [of CGTN] is to influence public opinion overseas in order to nudge foreign governments into making policies favourable towards China's Communist party" through subtle means. Australian researchers Thomas Fearon and Usha M. Rodrigues argued that CGTN has a "dichotomous role as a credible media competing for audience attention on the world stage, and a vital government propaganda organ domestically."
Editions TV channels NameLanguageLaunch datePrevious namesCGTNEnglish20 September 1997CGTN EspañolSpanish1 October 2007Split from CCTV-E&F.CGTN FrançaisFrench1 October 2007CGTN العربيةArabic25 July 2009CCTV-العربيةCGTN РусскийRussian10 September 2009CCTV-РусскийCGTN DocumentaryEnglish1 January 2011CCTV-9 Documentary
Radio stations
NameLanguageLaunch dateReplacedFormatSourceCGTN RadioEnglishNews and talk (with reruns of CGTN TV programming); Arabic, French, Russian and Spanish podcasts are available online
Online platforms NameLanguageLaunch dateReplacedFormatSourceCGTN TurkTurkish2023CRI Turkoperates a website and various social media platforms (Facebook, Instagram, X)CGTN MalayMalayCRI Malayoperates on Facebook onlyCGTN HausaHausaCRI Hausaoperates on Facebook onlyCGTN TajikistanTajikNoneoperates on Facebook and X only, videos translated from CGTN RussianCGTN UzbekistanUzbekoperates on Facebook and X only, videos translated from CGTN RussianCGTN ҚазақшаKazakhoperates on Facebook and X only, videos translated from CGTN RussianCGTN Кыргызча Kyrgyz operates on Facebook and X only, videos translated from CGTN Russian
Analysis and reception According to James Palmer at Foreign Policy, the contrasting aims of RT (formerly Russia Today) and CGTN, "mirrors wider strategies: Moscow wants chaos it can exploit, while Beijing wants a stable world order—on its terms". While "RT doesn't mind whether it goes to the far-left or the far-right," Chinese state media is permitted to "act from a very narrow, officially approved scope, and the risk of the political extremes is too much," according to journalist Hilton Yip. On the contrary to CGTN's investments in studios and numerous overseas bureaus, "the actual content is a mix of brutally tedious propaganda and bland documentaries. The audience is always the bosses in Beijing, not the average viewer overseas". Yip also noted the growing disillusionment of journalists in China who "are allowed to do little more than parrot the official line", citing a viral video of a journalist rolling her eyes at another reporter's softball question during a ministerial press conference, which "seemed to speak for many in the country who are tired of the charade that local media has become".
Despite a decade of overseas expansion, the redoubling of efforts by CGTN, and to an extension other state media, to push the party's theories and principles abroad is at odds with boosting China's overseas image. CGTN, along with other Chinese state media outlets, is still widely regarded as "editorially biased and full of propaganda, and they still struggle to attract large audiences", particularly in the age of widespread internet use with social media and nontraditional forms of media where the public has become "more averse to clumsy state-run propaganda than ever".
In his 2022 book Beijing's Global Media Offensive: China's Uneven Campaign to Influence Asia and the World, journalist Joshua Kurlantzick wrote that CGTN "tried to build itself a presence that could rival other global broadcasters like Al Jazeera, RT, the Turkish global broadcaster TRT World, and, the Chinese government hopes, giants like CNN and the BBC." In December 2022, he said that the government "wanted CGTN to be regarded as a credible source of information, like Al Jazeera", but described the idea as "something of a fantasy". He added: "Qatar is a small state, and it has significant foreign policy on a few certain issues. But outside of those issues, Qatar has basically left its Al Jazeera reporters alone. China was never going to be able to do that because virtually any issue could have an impact on China."
In a 2022 research paper comparing RT and CGTN's coverage of the 2020 United States presidential election, Martin Moore and Thomas Colley of King's College London described CGTN as using a "surface neutrality" propaganda model, noting that it "avoid[ed] expressing partisanship or framing US politics in an unduly biased or subjective way" in its coverage of the election, but it "dropp[ed] its objective tone in favour of being enthusiastically pro-China, without exception" in its coverage of geopolitical issues affecting China, and that CGTN did not publish content that was critical of or embarrassing to the Chinese government. They added: "Unlike RT, it frequently frames issues (such as the revelations about Trump's taxes) through the prism of the Chinese interest—even if the issues have no direct bearing on China. These characteristics contravene journalistic norms of independence from government and impartiality". Moore and Colley noted in another paper that during the election, "[CGTN] presented the US as poorly governed, plutocratic, racist and a destabilising international influence, and China as well governed, benign, stable, and as a rising superpower."
Bias, censorship, and disinformation
Critics have accused CGTN of broadcasting misinformation and making false allegations against opponents of the Chinese government. The network has been investigated and censured by Britain's Ofcom for biased coverage of the 2019–2020 Hong Kong protests and the airing of forced confessions. CGTN has been characterized as a vehicle for government propaganda and disinformation campaigns by Reporters Without Borders, BBC, and other sources.
Despite its revamp launching of CCTV America, critics have voiced concerns over the level of censorship exercised by the channel, especially on sensitive domestic issues in China. Philip Cunningham of Cornell University, who has appeared more than 100 times on CCTV talk shows, noted that sensitive issues such as Tibet and Xinjiang were heavily edited on various programs. Ma Jing, Director of CCTV America, defended the channel against such allegations by saying that the channel edits stories the same way other news organizations do. She said: "We uphold the traditional journalistic values. We consider accuracy, objectivity, truthfulness, and public accountability very important, more important than anything else."
In December 2018, the U.S. Department of Justice determined that CGTN must register under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) as an agent for the Chinese government and the Chinese Communist Party. In the subsequent FARA filing with the U.S. Department of Justice dated 2 February 2019, Ms. Ma Jing wrote that CGTN maintained editorial independence free from the state's influence and functioned similarly to other news media. A month later, in early March 2019, she was summoned to return to China.
On 18 September 2019, Nick Pollard, a British TV executive, resigned from his post as consultant and advisor to CGTN, giving his reason for leaving as being CGTN's failure to comply with Ofcom's rules on impartiality in connection to its coverage of the Hong Kong anti-extradition bill protests. He had joined CGTN in December 2018. Ofcom had several inquiries into CGTN going on in September 2019. In March 2021, CGTN was fined £225,000 by Ofcom for bias in its coverage of the 2019 pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong, which was found to have repeatedly breached fairness and impartiality requirements.
A September 2019 article in The Diplomat stated that CGTN "has a consistent record of blatantly and egregiously violating journalistic standards and encouraging or justifying hatred and violence against innocent people."
In July 2021, BBC News reported that CGTN initiated a drive to use foreign vloggers, such as Raz Gal-Or and Lee and Oli Barrett, as stringers to denounce negative coverage of Xinjiang. The use of these individuals prevents YouTube from labelling their content as state-sponsored content, although their videos are promoted by state media accounts. Australian cybersecurity researcher Robert Potter from Internet 2.0 said there was evidence that these vloggers were heavily promoted using a mix of 50 Cent Army, click farms, fake bot accounts, and fake news websites, all to "spoof YouTube into treating it like a legitimate view." Global Voices reported in October 2021 that CGTN had also hired Arabic-speaking social media influencers to frame Chinese government policies toward the Uyghurs as part of an anti-terrorist measure.
In February 2021, a Press Gazette investigation found that CGTN purchased ads on Facebook that denied any mistreatment of Uyghurs and promoted Xinjiang internment camps as "vocational training centres."
Broadcasting of forced confessions CCTV broadcast two forced confessions of the British journalist Peter Humphrey. The first was staged in August 2013, and was filmed by a CCTV crew with Humphrey locked in an iron chair inside a steel cage, wearing handcuffs and an orange prison vest. This was before he had been indicted, tried or convicted of a crime. The second, in July 2014, was once again filmed by CCTV, not in a cage this time, but still in a prison vest and handcuffs, before he had been tried or convicted on the charge of illegal information gathering. Both were aired in the UK by CGTN.
On 23 November 2018, Humphrey filed a complaint to Ofcom against CCTV, citing violations of the United Kingdom Broadcasting Code's Fairness and Privacy provisions. Humphrey said that both confessions were scripted and directed by the Chinese police, the public security bureau, while he was a prisoner, in conditions of duress amounting to torture. On 6 July 2020, Ofcom ruled that CGTN was guilty of breaching UK broadcasting standards in both incidents. The ruling stated that CGTN had breached Humphrey's privacy and that in the channel's reporting, "material facts were presented, disregarded or omitted in a way that was unfair to Mr Humphrey".
In November 2019, CGTN aired a video of a UK consular employee, Simon Cheng, in captivity "confessing" to consorting with prostitutes. Within a week, Cheng had filed a complaint with Ofcom.