The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) decided to “freeze” the visas of two Indian journalists based in Beijing, indicating that more “countermeasures” could follow against other Indian journalists, unless New Delhi offers reciprocal visa and tenure terms to Chinese journalists in India.

According to a Hindustan Times report citing sources, state-run Prasar Bharati’s representative in Beijing, Anshuman Mishra, and The Hindu’s correspondent, Ananth Krishnan, were informed by Chinese officials that they should not return to China as their visas were frozen. Both Mishra and Krishnan had recently visited India for personal reasons.

The move followed the Indian side informing a New Delhi-based correspondent of state-run Xinhua news agency last month that his Indian visa would not be renewed. The Xinhua correspondent was asked to return to China by 31 March and has since gone back, according to the report.

Meanwhile, two other journalists belonging to the news agency PTI and the Hindustan Times, currently in China, have been informed by the MFA that they could stay on for now even as it is considering its options and “countermeasures” against what it claims is India’s unfair treatment of Chinese journalists.

The MEA declined to comment formally on the move. However, sources denied that India had taken any action against Chinese journalists in the recent past.

They said that many Chinese reporters based in Delhi had left during the Covid pandemic and not returned, and it was “factually incorrect” to suggest any “measures” that merited “counter-measures” had been employed against them, according to The Hindu report.

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