China nixes Google censorship move

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China says Google "totally wrong" to stop web censorship
Posted: 23 March 2010 0655 hrs

BEIJING - China said Tuesday Google had "violated its written promise" and is "totally wrong" to stop censoring its Chinese language search engine and to blame Beijing for alleged hacker attacks.

The comments came from an official in charge of the Internet bureau of the State Council Information Office, according to the state-run Xinhua news agency.

"Google has violated its written promise it made when entering the Chinese market by stopping filtering its searching service and blaming China in insinuation for alleged hacker attacks," said the official.

"This is totally wrong. We're uncompromisingly opposed to the politicisation of commercial issues, and express our discontent and indignation to Google for its unreasonable accusations and conducts," the official added.

Hours earlier Google said it had ended censorship of its Chinese-language search engine Google.cn and was redirecting mainland Chinese users to an uncensored site in Hong Kong.

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Google China office in Beijing

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Google also said it intended to continue research and development work in China and to maintain a sales presence there.

Google's lifting of censorship on Google.cn comes a little more than two months after the Mountain View, California-based company said it had been the victim of cyberattacks originating from China.

The White House said it was disappointed that Google could not reach a deal with Beijing.

"We are disappointed that Google and the Chinese government were unable to reach an agreement that would allow Google to continue operating its search services in China on its Google.cn website," National Security Council spokesman Mike Hammer said in a statement.

- AFP /ls

From ChannelNewsAsia.com; see the source article here.

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