Xinwen Lianbo

It is always presented by two news presenters, usually one male and one female. From 1989 to 2006, the main newscasters were Xing Zhibin and Luo Jing,[2] assisted by four others.[1] On 5 June 2006, two younger newscasters were introduced, namely Li Zimeng and Kang Hui.[1]

• Bao Xiaofeng (female, 宝晓峰)
• Gang Qiang (male, 剛強/刚强)
• Guo Zhijian (male, 郭志堅/郭志坚)
• Hai Xia (female, 海霞)
• Li Zimeng (female, 李梓萌)
• Kang Hui (male, 康輝/康辉)
• Ouyang Xiadan (female, 歐陽夏丹/欧阳夏丹)
• Pan Tao (male, 潘涛)
• Yan Yuxin (male, 严於信)
• Zheng Li (female, 郑丽)

• Du Xian (female, 杜憲/杜宪) Removed after expressing sad emotion to 1989 Tiananmen Square protest.[9]
• Lang Yongchun (male, 郎永淳)
• Li Ruiying (female, 李瑞英)
• Li Xiuping (female, 李修平)
• Luo Jing (male, 羅京/罗京) Deceased
• Wang Ning (male, 王寧/王宁)
• Xing Zhibin (female, 邢質斌/邢质斌)
• Xue Fei (male, 薛飛/薛飞) Removed after expressing sad emotion to the 1989 Tiananmen Square protest.[9]
• Zhang Hongmin (male, 張宏民/张宏民)

[10]

What is the judgement for important news in the minds of many Chinese journalists working for the official media or for propaganda journalism today? Xu Zhaorong, a reporter of Xinhua makes the following 14 observations (Symposium of Journalism 1998):

• 1. Important activities, personnel changes and meetings of the party and the state, such as the banquets of the National Day, meetings of Party and the national People's Congress;
• 2. The activities of party and state leaders, such as their inspection tours, their meetings with foreign guests, their meetings with home delegates, the departures and arrival of their visits abroad and the tea parties hosted by them;
• 3. Important policies, guidelines, laws, rule, regulations and documents of the party and the state;
• 4. Important commentaries on important events and policies...
  — Li Xiguang

Effectively, Xinwen Lianbo is a mouthpiece for the party and the state. As with all news broadcasts in mainland China, the running order is dictated by the socio-political importance of the individual or group concerned (rather than other news values). Therefore, the activities of the General Secretary of the Communist Party of China are almost always the first item, followed by reports on the members of the Politburo Standing Committee in rank order.[2] Diplomatic engagements are usually shown before domestic engagements. Significant statements from the Central People's Government or the Communist Party of China have been read out, in full, after the headlines.[11] When significant events or speeches are covered, the camera will carefully pan across the Politburo Standing Committee.[12]

The program has been heavily criticized for its formulaic presentation of news items and its heavy focus on party and state leaders, and its lack of critical focus. Around half of the programming on average is dedicated to political content: party announcements, government meetings, or leaders' activities.[13]

The programme plays a role in the CPC's communication mechanisms at both the mass and élite levels. Zhan Jiang, professor at China Youth University for Political Sciences, aptly summed up its content in three phrases: "The leaders are busy, the motherland is developing rapidly, other countries are in chaos."[14]

On the one hand, it is the news source with the widest reach amongst China's large population,[15] and so it provides the Party with the opportunity to influence the masses. According to Li, watching the bulletin has traditionally been "a national ritual at the family dinner table."

On the other hand, it has been used as a mechanism to signal changes and continuities in policy and personnel. New policies have been introduced by special features, such as the 'model cadre' used to promote Three Represents in 2002. The ranked shots of the Politburo Standing Committee indicate their relative power: "Each leader is allocated a certain number of seconds in front of the camera, Chinese media experts say, with the time for each one carefully regulated by the party propaganda department."[2] This lies behind the programme's extreme formality, because any miscommunication could have serious consequences.

All times are (UTC+08:00).

• CCTV-1 (free-to-air channel), CCTV-13 (news channel) and CCTV-7 (national defense and military channel): Daily at 19:00-19:30 CST a subsidiary of China Central Television.

• CCTV-4 (international channel)： Next Day at 22:30-23:00 and 02:00-02:30 (Asia), 03:00-03:30 (Europe), 05:30-06:00 (America) CST.
• CCTV-13: Daily at 21:00-21:30 CST.
• CCTV-1 (free-to-air channel)： Next Day at 04:59-05:29 CST.

•  Japan:
  • CCTVDaifu with Japanese version: Daily at 20:00-20:30 JST (19:00-19:30 CST).

On 27 December 2007, Xinwen Lianbo aired a report about the wide and easy availability of explicit content on the internet. The report appealed to juristic institutions and government to hurry to make relevant legislation in order to purify the internet environment. In the report, a young student described a pop-up advertisement she saw as being "very erotic very violent".[20] After the airing of the report, many parodies were posted by internet users ridiculing the comment and CCTV's credibility in part.[21] The incident also questioned the reliability of Xinwen Lianbo, noting the unlikelihood of a web page being both violent and erotic at the same time (even though such pages do exist), and the age of the student interviewed. Personal information of the interviewed girl was later also leaked, identifying the girl in the report by name.[22] Online message boards were populated by large threads about the incident,[23] and a satirical work even stated that CCTV's website was the number one "very erotic very violent" website on the internet,[24] with some users even creating their own toplists of sites which meet these criteria,[25] the "top 8 very erotic very violent sports events"[26] and even identifying things that are yellow as being erotic (since 黄, huáng, the Mandarin character for "yellow", also means "erotic").[27]

On 23 January 2011, the program showcased the Chengdu J-10 in the air by firing a missile at an airplane, the target plane then exploded. This footage lasted half a second, and the destroyed airplane shown was identified as that of an F-5E, a US fighter jet. It turns out the clip was taken from the 1986 US film Top Gun.[28][29][30][31]