FILE - In this July 2, 2019, file photo, Chinese President Xi Jinping sits during a meeting at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing. Chinese authorities have declined to renew the press credentials of a Beijing-based Wall Street Journal reporter…
BEIJING - Chinese authorities have declined to renew the press credentials of a Beijing-based Wall Street Journal reporter, effectively expelling a journalist who extensively covered President Xi Jinping and Communist Party politics.
The foreign ministry said Friday in response to a faxed question about Singaporean reporter Chun Han Wong's visa that some foreign journalists with the “evil intention to smear and attack China” are “not welcome.”
The action comes one month after Wong co-wrote a story detailing an Australian investigation into alleged links between Xi's cousin and money laundering and suspected organized crime.
A spokesperson for Dow Jones, the WSJ's parent company, said in a statement that authorities declined to renew Wong's press credentials. The spokesperson said the company is looking into the matter but did not elaborate.
Wong declined to comment.