China Using 'State Secrets' Label To Hide Pollution

eldavojohn writes "More problems have surfaced as people attempt to bring soil pollution problems to light in China. From the article: 'When Pan sued the Hebei Department of Environmental Protection in 2011, he was given access to the environmental impact assessment that the environment ministry claimed it had done in the village. Pan discovered that the assessment, carried out by the Chinese Academy of Meteorological Sciences, had names of people who had left the village two decades previously and even a person who had been dead for two years — all "expressing favor" for the project. Pan surveyed 100 people in his village, showing them the purported environmental impact study. The majority of them gave him written statements that declared: "I've never seen this form," according to documents seen by Reuters.' Reuters has also discovered that China uses 'state secrets' labels to hide environmental studies and pollution numbers as well as using strong arm tactics to silence residents attempting to do their own studies."

Comments

China Using 'State Secrets' Label...

[fustakrakich]

Gee, welcome to the club.

I'm only surprised they bothered to label it

[YesIAmAScript]

Come on, the issue here isn't abuse of a state secrets process.

The issue is the Chinese government (national level) is not based upon any principles of openness. They hide anything and everything that might threaten their place in power. The only time it comes out is when trying to keep it secret would hurt even more (i.e when a coverup is exposed).

Re:I'm only surprised they bothered to label it

[anagama]

They hide anything and everything that might threaten their place in power.

And this is distinctive from America how? In America, the State Secrets Doctrine has its roots in a wrongful death suit by the widows of some RCA engineers who were working for the US Air Force when they died in a plane crash in 1948. During discovery, the widows sought the accident report. The Air Force said that it contained information vital to national security and would not turn it over. Eventually, the case got to the Supreme Court, and without actually looking at the document, ruled that it could be kept secret. 40 some years later, it was declassified. It contained nothing in it beyond what was publicly known about the project, but it also revealed that the Air Force had negligently failed to install manufacturer recommended heat shields in the engines, among other issues with the plane, and that the engines caught fire leading to the crash.

http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/383/origin-story?act=2#play

So you tell me, is our State Secrets doctrine, the one that Obama has used to prevent people from suing for unlawful detention, unlawful torture, unlawful wiretapping, and unlawful execution, based in anything but an attempt to avoid embarrassment and liability? How is it that we are morally superior to the Chinese government on this issue?

Examples:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/10/us/10torture.html?_r=0
http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2009/10/obama-administration-invokes-state-secrets-privilegeagain/
http://www.politico.com/blogs/joshgerstein/0811/Obama_admin_asserts_state_secrets_privilege_to_dismiss_Muslims_suit.html
http://www.salon.com/2010/09/25/secrecy_7/

Re:I'm only surprised they bothered to label it

[anagama]

I agree with you that China should clean up its act. But what bugged me was the parent poster's seeming attitude that China was different somehow. I should have quoted the comment more fully:

The issue is the Chinese government (national level) is not based upon any principles of openness. They hide anything and everything that might threaten their place in power. The only time it comes out is when trying to keep it secret would hurt even more (i.e when a coverup is exposed).

I would have no issue with the comment if it read "The issue with government in general" -- or "The issue is the Chinese government (national level), like that of most, is not based ..."

It strikes me as hypocritical to suggest that China has some distinctive secrecy evil that one's own government steadfastly avoids (specifically, that secrecy is usually about protection from embarrassment, liability, or corruption/special industry favors). It's like a crack head denigrating a heroin addict as a dope fiend. Maybe I read too much into it, but that was my impression.

Lousy REDACTED.

[ColdWetDog]

I can't imagine living in REDACTED country where REDACTED was allowed to REDACTED REDACTED REDACTED. You'd think in the US, the REDACTED of Information Act would REDACTED this sort of thing but instead we find REDACTED REDACTED.

Re:Lousy REDACTED.

[__aaltlg1547]

In the USA, most government information IS open. But don't try to find out what chemicals frackers might be pumping down oil wells and into your groundwater. THEY are very much protected from public scrutiny.

This will only work

[kilodelta]

Until China starts experiencing a massive die off due to the pollution. Eventually they'll probably wake up to the fact and require manufacturing to install preventive measure. By that point manufacturing in China will be as expensive as it is in the United States. I wonder what big business will do then?

Re:This will only work

[GeneralTurgidson]

Africa

Re:This will only work

[Runaway1956]

Actually - China is working on a controlled die off anyway. They got to many people. They have limited the right to reproduce. One couple, one child. That is not a sustainable birth rate. China is intentionally decreasing their population, right now, as we sit and chat about it. A few catastrophes aren't going to deter them.

Predictable Replies

[Anonymous Coward]

Expected replies for China article on /.

1. "It's not like ______ didn't do it before/isn't doing it too."
2. "Why is this news, we expect this from China."
3. "So what, it's their country. We have no right to judge."

Let us embrace such wisdom and apply it consistently, for US/Europe articles too!
No country should bear criticism on Slashdot!
Join me in extending these fallacies EVERYWHERE my brothers and sisters!

Re:Predictable Replies

[kheldan]

How about this reply:

Between China and India they have, what, somewhere between a third and half the population of the world? Has it occurred to anyone else that between them with their more or less uncontrolled polluting, they're undoing everything that every other industrialized country is doing to reverse global warming?

Re:Predictable Replies

[Anonymous Coward]

Between China and India they have, what, somewhere between a third and half the population of the world? Has it occurred to anyone else that between them with their more or less uncontrolled polluting, they're undoing everything that every other industrialized country is doing to reverse global warming?

YES. This. Precisely this. Whenever I hear the environmentalists spout their screed about conservation, cutbacks and carbon I want to smack them upside the head for completely ignoring what's going in China and India. They either take the rest of us for complete fools or are fools themselves. Either way, I want nothing to do with them. However, just in case there are some out there reading, riddle me this. The Chinese and Indian governments have already said that they will do essentially nothing on climate change. They want their 100 years of pollution and development and have basically told the environmentalists in the United States and Europe to go f*** themselves. There is zero chance that the Chinese and Indians are going to tell their people, "We know that you want that house with the two car garage, a gas guzzler vehicle and that big ass TV, but we cannot let you have these things because of climate change." They would have a revolution on their hands or what the Chinese call "social instability". So any sacrifices that you greens make here in the United States and Europe are meaningless as regards global temperature rises from greenhouse gas emissions. In other words, you're wasting your time because China and India will never agree to cooperate in any meaningful ways. You stand on principles if you want to, but I'd rather just enjoy what time we have left.

Re:Predictable Replies

[furbyhater]

At least the environmentalists in your country get up from their ass and try to improve SOMETHING. You can't really expect them to move to China in a completely foreign environment to protest coal plants there. What are you doing, except sitting on your ass working, consuming and trying to get everyone into the same hopeless and jaded state of mind that you are in? Congratulations, genius!

So what's so remarkable about that?

[ErnyCowan]

In Canada our Conservative government has very similar policies. Using legislative process that suppressed scrutiny and debate it scrapped many environmental protection laws and regulations, eviscerated government science and oversight programs. It muzzles what scientists still remain buy requiring anyone in the civil service or or on contract with the government to receive approval from the Prime Minister's office before making any statement to the public. It even imposes these restrictions on non-Canadian agencies that need government approval to do research in Canada. That's what happens when ideologues get in control. - Erny