SOUTHWEST CHINA -- THE SATELLITES ARE HIGH AND THE EMPEROR

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 04 CHENGDU 000030

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

STATE FOR EAP/CM AND EAP/PD

E.O. 12958: DECL: 2/21/2018
TAGS: SOCI PHUM ECPS KIPR CH
SUBJECT: SOUTHWEST CHINA -- THE SATELLITES ARE HIGH AND THE EMPEROR
IS FAR AWAY

REF: (A) 2007 BEIJING 7330 (B) 2007 CHENGDU 00267

CHENGDU 00000030 001.2 OF 004


CLASSIFIED BY: James Boughner, Consul General, U.S. Consulate
General, Chengdu, China.
REASON: 1.4 (d)

1. (C) Summary: Satellite television ties rural Chinese to
urban culture and brings unjammed foreign broadcasts to a large
audience throughout China. Simple satellite receiver dish
packages selling for USD 50 bring central Chinese television to
rural areas and the world to Chinese cities. To judge by the
small dishes the Consulate has observed on apartments in
Southwest China, the many online satellite pirates who market
inexpensive descrambler receivers do a large business. Local
governments sometimes jam home dishes in violation of Chinese
regulations. Some Muslims in Gansu and southern Yunnan receive
Arabic language TV broadcasts from the Middle East. End Summary.



Satellite TV Brings the City to Rural China

--------------


2. (SBU) Greatly improved roads and job opportunities in the
city, the internet, mobile phones, and now satellite television
bring the city closer to rural China than ever before in its
history. This is especially true in Southwest China, a region
where transportation and communications have been historically
difficult due to difficult and mountainous terrain. Some local
governments subsidize village satellite TV/cable systems which
replaced the networks of rural TV relay transmitters about a
decade ago. Satellite dishes aren't just used for village cable
TV but are increasingly seen outside individual homes in rural
China. These dishes are aimed at specific PRC satellites such
as Chinasat 6B which offers 45 channels of unscrambled
provincial and central television and 90 radio channels
including Tibetan for Qinghai Province and Mongolian for Inner
Mongolia. Domestic satellites broadcasting on the 5 GHz C band
and can be received with a dish of 90 centimeters throughout
China although most of these dishes are 1.2 - 1.5 meters large.
See
http://www.lyngsat.com/china6b.html for details and a satellite
coverage map. Other unscrambled channels from India and other
countries, including VOA television, could be received by moving
the dish, but most rural people do not have the language skills
to understand or the expertise to make the necessary adjustments
to receive foreign broadcasts.



And the World to Urban China

--------------


3. (C) In Chengdu and many other southwest China cities,
luxury apartment complexes often receive foreign television
channels including CNN from rooftop dishes and pipe the signals
onto cable systems along with regular Chinese cable TV channels.
Getting foreign television was once reserved to higher ranking
Communist Party and government officials. Now many better off
urbanites in luxury complexes now also get foreign television
including Hong Kong and Taiwan channels or put up their own
dishes. Small 60 cm 12 GHz ku-band dishes are often seen on
apartment balconies.



Boring TV, Hidden Dish

--------------


4. (SBU) Some PRC websites advertise small dishes that can be
placed almost invisibly within an apartment just inside a
window, as pictured in a pirate television online forum at
http://tinyurl.com/yuqkdy . While there are many unscrambled
domestic channels on the 5 GHz C satellite broadcast band, some
urban dwellers with access to cable television are aiming for
scrambled Chinese Hong Kong and Taiwan including localized
versions of HBO and ESPN with Chinese subtitles. While it is
possible to pay licensing fees, a large proportion are likely
taking advantage of inexpensive receiver/descramblers which the
increasing amount of computer processing power built into
digital satellite receivers has made possible.




5. (SBU) Satellite television is now becoming more widespread,
but Chinese intellectuals have been fascinated with this window
to the world for sometime. For example, in 2000, just before
the Taiwan presidential elections, a well-known Chinese writer
went to a friend's house in the suburbs of Beijing to watch
Taiwan satellite TV coverage of the elections. Improvements in
technology, especially with the switch from analog to digital

CHENGDU 00000030 002.2 OF 004


video transmission have multiplied the numbers of channels
available and made pictures clearer and receiving equipment much
cheaper.



Satellite Piracy as a Front in the IPR Wars

--------------


6. (SBU) Hotels, schools and some businesses can purchase
dishes openly but sales to private individuals are often done
with a veneer of secrecy. Police crack down sometimes - a
company selling dishes openly was closed down in northwest
Chengdu near Chengdu S&T University (Chengdu Ligong Daxue] in
September 2007 People can easily find electronic markets and TV
repair shops in Chengdu that supply dishes. Some will deliver
the dishes in person or ship them through the mail. A
motorcycle drawn cart carrying dishes (resembling shallow tubs
more than satellite dishes but with four strategically placed
holes) appeared during a December visit to a Chengdu wholesale
electronics market.




7. (SBU) The "Fazhi Ribao" in August 2006 reported on a
nationwide crackdown on illegal home satellite dishes, noting
that these dishes violate the PRC State Council Order (1993) 129
"Satellite Receiving Station Equipment Management Regulations".
These regulations forbid the private installation or use of
satellite receiving dishes without the permission of the local
broadcasting bureau and provincial level government. These
regulations also forbid the production and sale of satellite
equipment without authorization.




8. (SBU) Cell phone text message advertisements promoting home
satellite dishes are common in Chengdu. Websites promoting both
legal dishes and receivers and illegal descrambling codes for a
very nominal extra charge are run in Chengdu and elsewhere. For
example, the Shenyang Evening News in northeast China reported
in August 2006 that 3000 homes in Shenyang bought systems from a
Shenyang satellite pirate that provides satellite television
decryption codes for six different satellites to customers who
login for an annual fee of RMB 100 (USD 7) per year. The
satellites carry many foreign programs including adult
programming. The pirate buys legitimate plug in cards and then
plugs them into a computer that then transfers the codes to any
customer who logs in.




9. (SBU) The Chengdu website Southwest Satellite Television (
http://www.cdtvro.com),although its
top page is flanked by the cyber police cartoon characters Mr.
Jing and Ms. Cha, not only introduces technical information but
a wide range of equipment for decrypting encrypted satellite
television. Many websites that offer for sale inexpensive
satellite equipment, especially small dishes for the 12 GHz Ku
band boast of the many foreign channels their customers can
receive, but do not mention that many of those channels are
scrambled. No problem though, since when customers buy the
receiver is already set up to receive the scrambled channels.
One of the most heavily promoted satellites on Chinese satellite
TV marketing websites is Asiasat 3S carries many scrambled Star
TV channels destined for Hong Kong viewers. Asiasat3S also
offers carries unscrambled channels from VOA television, Hong
Kong, India and Pakistan as well as clear digital audio
transmissions of VOA and Radio Free Asia broadcasts. VOA
Chinese language call-in shows attract callers from both sides
of the Taiwan straits. Asiasat 2S offers a strong signal and
many channels in Arabic from the Middle East. See for example,

http://www.lyngsat.com/asiasat3s.html and

http://www.lyngsat.com/asia2.html for details on what Chinese
programs Chinese viewers can get from those two satellites. .



A Satellite Pirate Compares Pirate and Legitimate Pricing

-------------- --------------


10. (C) Satellite TV entrepreneurs are not hard to find but
don't like to meet people in their office. With a cell phone
call, a meeting at a small "satellite office" with nearly no
inventory to be lost in a raid, is easily arranged. A Chengdu

CHENGDU 00000030 003.2 OF 004


satellite dish and receiver seller met Congenoff in a small
office on the third floor of an electronics market hive of small
shops. Inside the office HBO, a scrambled broadcast was running
on a small satellite TV. The businessman said that a satellite
dish and receiver capable of receiving scrambled television
channels sells for RMB 600 (USD $95). When asked what it would
cost the legal way, the businessman said the receiver costs RMB
8000 (USD 1150) with an additional RMB 6000 to be paid each year
for receiving scrambled satellite broadcasts.



Hubei Local Government Illegally Jams Home Dishes

-------------- ---


11. (SBU) Apparently regretting the loss of viewers to distant
stations, some local governments illegally jam satellite
receivers. An October 2007 issue of China Radio (Zhongguo
Wuxiandian) by three engineers at the Yichang, Hubei Province
radio monitoring station discusses their investigation of
satellite TV interference in the Three Gorges area. In April
2007, the Three Gorges Development Co. informed the monitoring
station that company employees and 3000 other nearby households
were complaining about terrible television reception on the
local cable system. The engineers found a strong jamming signal
which they traced back to the Letianxi Township Broadcasting
Bureau. The Bureau admitted to transmitting jamming signals on
the 4 GHz satellite TV frequencies to stop people from using
home TV dishes in violation of regulations. The engineers
condemned the Broadcasting Bureau for violating national
regulations and disturbing local people and brought the case to
the attention of higher level leaders.



MII Responds with Urgent Notice Reaffirming No Jamming Policy

-------------- --------------


12. (SBU) In September 2007, the PRC Ministry of Information
Industry issued its ministerial notice (2007) 459 "Urgent
Notice Forbidding the Design, Manufacture and Use of Television
Jamming Equipment" (see
http://tinyurl.com/ypkhp3 for Chinese text) which "condemns a
small number of units, which out of their own selfish interest,
have recently been jamming TV broadcasts, making it impossible
for them to get Central Chinese Television, and so disturbing
the populace as to damage local harmony and social stability."



Religious and Ethnic Minorities Tune in to Satellite TV

-------------- --------------


13. (C) Chinese satellite TV broadcasts including Mongolian
from Inner Mongolia TV, Tibetan from Qinghai Province TV and
TAR TV and four channels of Uighur language TV from the Xinjiang
Uighur AR make it possible for widely dispersed minority people
to receive TV in their own languages. TAR TV's Tibetan language
channel TAR 2, has some local programming along with many
Chinese movies dubbed into Tibetan. US diplomats traveling in
Qinghai Province (Ref A) and in southern Yunnan Province (Ref
B) have noticed many satellite dishes used to receive TV
broadcasts from the Middle East including some at Islamic
schools.



Tibetan Monks Enjoy Indian TV

--------------


14. (C) In the Tibetan Autonomous Region and other ethnic
Tibetan areas of China, technically skilled monks set up
satellite TV systems with inconspicuous dishes for their
brethren. Not only do the monks get news broadcasts otherwise
denied them, they also enjoy foreign entertainment. In some
monasteries, Indian dance programs have become so popular that
it has become a fad to move their heads back and forth as Indian
dancers do and to shake their head to mean "yes" as in India.
The monks may also be watching the several Buddhist satellite
channels from Taiwan as well.




15. (C) The October 2007 VOA television interview with the
Dalai Lama in Tibetan was received at some monasteries in

CHENGDU 00000030 004.2 OF 004


Tibetan areas of China. VOA and RFA have audio feeds on TV
broadcast satellites that are not jammed and for practical
reasons (satellite dishes pointed up at a dish strongly reject
ground signal coming from the side) would be difficult to jam
effectively over a radius greater than a few miles.



Comment

--------------


16. (C) Satellite news leaks through China's information
firewall along with the foreign satellite entertainment
programming that the bored viewers of Chinese central television
are turning to. One Chengdu businessman commented that getting
Taiwan television wouldn't likely change people's attitudes
because what Taiwan television broadcasts show are mostly
entertainment programs and not the documentary programs that
would give people on the mainland an understanding to of
Taiwan's impressive democracy. As a provider of alternative
unfiltered news satellite TV may prove to be quite influential.





17. (U) This cable was coordinated with Embassy Beijing and
Consulate General Chengdu.
BOUGHNER