“China today decided to restrict the personal freedom of Reuters’ correspondent in Peking as a reprisal for the ‘unjustified persecution’ of Communist reporters by the British authorities in Hongkong,” reported the South China Morning Post on July 22, 1967. “Peking Radio said the Chinese Government had told the correspondent, Mr Anthony Grey, that he would not be allowed to leave his residence in Peking until further notice.
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“Today’s action by the Peking authorities follows a two-year prison sentence imposed on a correspondent of China’s official news agency, the New China News Agency, in Hongkong. The correspondent, Hsieh Ping, was arrested during the current wave of anti-British demonstrations in the Colony. He was sentenced on Wednesday on charges of unlawful assembly and taking part in an intimidating assembly.
The South China Morning Post’s report on Anthony Grey’s house arrest in 1967. Photo: SCMP Archives
“The New China News Agency yesterday demanded that the Hongkong authorities cancel the imprisonment sentence on Hsieh and ‘promptly and unconditionally’ release him.
“Mr Grey, 29, was assigned to Peking in March this year after serving as Reuters’ correspondent in East Berlin. Peking Radio said he was summoned to the Chinese Foreign Ministry today to be told of the restrictions on his free movement. He was also told that the Government had cancelled the visa it had issued him.
On December 5, 1968, the Post followed up, that “a Chinese diplomat here said today he did not expect Reuters’ Peking correspondent, Mr Anthony Grey, who has been under house arrest for 16 months, to be released until 13 Chinese journalists now detained in Hongkong were freed.
Anthony Grey’s house arrest followed a two-year prison sentence imposed on a correspondent of the New China News Agency, in Hong Kong. Photo: AFP
“In Hongkong, a Government spokesman, commenting on the report, said last night: ‘If this news report is accurate, it can only be interpreted as a complete change in the original reasons given for Grey’s detention and can only further emphasise the total lack of regard by the Chinese authorities for normal standards of behaviour.’
