China Returns Fire Against US In Google-War, Media Dismisses US Internet Push

An official Chinese newspaper on Friday dismissed Washington's call to lift Internet censorship, after a top Chinese diplomat warned the Obama administration to heed alarm bells over trade, Taiwan and Tibet.

Chinese media has dished out scathing criticism after a call by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for China and other nations to lift their restrictions on the internet, denouncing it as "information imperialism".

Clinton's speech in Washington elevated internet freedom as a major facet of the US human rights agenda as never before. Clinton's speech raised contention with Beijing over the cyber policy, which flared after Google Inc, the world's biggest search engine operator, last week warned it could pull out of China over complaints about hacking and censorship.

The Chinese government had no immediate response to U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's speech on Thursday calling for China and other authoritarian governments to lift their curbs on citizens' use of the Internet.

“We are firmly opposed to these words and deeds which are against the facts and damage Sino-U.S. relations,” Foreign Ministry Spokesman Ma Zhaoxu said in a Chinese-language statement posted on the ministry’s Web site. “We urge the U.S. side to respect facts and stop using the issue of so-called Internet freedom to make unjustified attacks on China.”

The Global Times, an English-language newspaper published by the state, said that the information from the West comes "loaded with aggressive rhetoric against those countries that do not follow their lead," said the English-language paper, published by the Chinese Communist Party's official People's Daily as part of a government-sponsored campaign to develop international media and influence opinion about China overseas.

Ma urged the U.S. to "properly handle differences and sensitive issues," in order to maintain the healthy development of U.S.-China relations.

Ma's statement made no specific reference to Google Inc.(NASDAQ:GOOG), the company's charge that it suffered cyber attacks from China, or its threat to halt operations in China due to Internet censorship.

However, Google has suggested it may still resolve the matter. Eric Schmidt, chief executive of Google, told the Financial Times yesterday: "It’s very important to know we are not pulling out of China. We have a good business in China. This is about the censorship rules, not anything else.”