The rambunctious Mexican press

Posted by Tim Johnson

A shoving match broke out last Friday at the Great Hall of the People, right in front of President Hu Jintao and Mexican President Felipe Calderon. By the time it was over, after the shouting died down, a security guard stood there with one sleeve missing from his jacket. And a female reporter sported a fat lip.

Unless you are an avid reader of Spanish-language media (click here and here), you haven’t read about this elsewhere. No mention of the incident was made in the Chinese press. But I venture to say such events can play a role in diplomatic affairs, at least at lower levels in the respective foreign ministries.

This is what happened: The traveling Mexican press corps was invited into the Great Hall of the People Friday for the beginning of a meeting between Hu and Calderon. As is customary before such encounters, the Chinese Foreign Ministry informed the Mexicans of the protocol. The press corps would be invited in only for the first five minutes or so of the meeting for what is vernacularly known as a “photo op,” then ushered out.

But Los Pinos, as the Mexican presidential palace is known, apparently didn’t tell the Mexican press corps that it wouldn’t be allowed to witness the whole meeting.

When Chinese security guards began trying to usher the 20 or so Mexican reporters, photographers and television cameramen out of the salon, they resisted – mightily. The two sides began grappling, pushing and even tussling in front of the leaders.

According to the Spanish language report from the EFE news service, “the altercation made President Hu arch his eyebrows in a clear gesture of disgust, while functionaries of the Chinese foreign ministry felt clear irritation at a type of behavior seen as ‘not very polite’ in this Asian nation.”   

The security guards finally pushed and shoved the journalists out of the room, but not before a reporter tore the sleeve off one guard’s jacket. The injured Mexican reporter took a hit by a tape recorder on her mouth.

So I guess the hot-blooded Mexican journalists left their mark on China.