Deutsche Welle (DW) Director General Peter Limbourg has held talks on bilateral cooperation with senior representatives of Chinese broadcasters during his visit to Beijing.

From August 27 to 29, 2014, Limbourg met in the Chinese capital with, among others, the vice president of the state-run China Central Television (CCTV) as well as the presidents of the state educational broadcaster, China Education Television (CETV) and CCTV’s nationwide digital platform (CDP). Talks with the director general of China Radio International were also on the agenda.
 
Limbourg said the goal was “to present the journalistic offerings of Germany’s international broadcaster and to examine possibilities for an extended cooperation.” He said the discussions took place in “a good atmosphere and were very constructive.”

Various collaborative projects have been agreed upon with CCTV with the aim of building further cultural ties between the two countries. Both sides are looking into possible co-productions in the fields of music and business. A contract was signed with the cultural broadcaster SHTV, for the sale of more than 100 hours of DW Transtel programs. The cooperation will be expanded through a Chinese edition of DW’s weekly cultural magazine Arts.21. CDP will continue to broadcast the Chinese adaptation of DW’s lifestyle magazine Euromaxx for another three years. The program is available in 140 million Chinese households, via the Chinese World Geographic Channel, and is also accessible as video-on-demand at www.tv.cn.

Limbourg discussed, with Beijing TV, DW’s possible participation in the Beijing International Documentary Festival. The station recently acquired the license for the purchase of DW Transtel programs. Since June 2014, the educational broadcaster CETV has also taken 150 hours of DW Transtel programs. The programs are among the most popular documentaries in Beijing.

On September 4, Limbourg addressed representatives of both German and Chinese media at the 5th Sino-German Media Forum of the Robert Bosch Stiftung. In his speech under the title “Fight or Cooperate? The Global TV Networks and Their Roles in the World,” Limbourg called for the lifting of the Chinese blockade of DW and firmly rejected all censorship measures. Earlier he had held extensive talks with Chinese officials on the theme of press freedom. (Source: DW press release)