Journalist Marije Vlaskamp, who for de Volkskrant writes about China has been seriously threatened last fall. That reports the Saturday newspaper. Bomb threats have been made on her behalf at, among others, the Chinese embassy in The Hague and Oslo. Telegram demanded that she take down an article critical of China. It is not known who exactly is behind the threat and intimidation. The Dutch Public Prosecution Service has launched an investigation into the false bomb threat, but has not yet arrested anyone.
Vlaskamp was a correspondent in China from 2001 to 2019. Since then she has been working in the Netherlands as a foreign editor for de Volkskrant. In addition, she regularly writes critically about the Chinese state and about sensitive topics such as the oppression of Uyghurs and the activities of Chinese dissidents in the Netherlands. One such dissident, Wang Jingyu, also received threatening messages via Telegram.
Wang received the threatening messages from someone calling himself “Alice.” “If you continue to impose yourself on anti-Chinese media, the police will come and arrest you,” one of them read. A day later, a bomb threat was made under his name and that of Vlaskamp at the Chinese embassy in The Hague, later a bomb threat was added in Oslo. It sounds like a classic tactic of the Chinese regime. Even within the country itself, dissidents are often tackled by accusing them of, for example, misconduct or corruption.
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‘Unacceptable’
The Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs says in a response de Volkskrant that it is “very worrying” that the Vlaskamp and Wang had to deal with “such far-reaching intimidation”. That such intimidation takes place in the Netherlands is “unacceptable” as far as the ministry is concerned. It has therefore asked for clarification from the Chinese embassy. In October, that embassy would have informed the ministry itself about the bomb threat in The Hague and also passed on Vlaskamp’s name.
Editor-in-chief Pieter Klok van de Volkskrant says coverage of China is under threat. This has been tried to silence Vlaskamp with “threats and intimidations”, he also finds unacceptable. “We have often experienced that correspondents are hindered in the performance of their work. But we have never seen reporters here intimidated and threatened by what appears to be a foreign power.”