Dutch Journalist Covering Beijing Olympics Pulled Away by Guard During Live Broadcast

A Dutch journalist was interrupted and pulled out of frame by a Chinese security guard while covering the Beijing Olympics on Friday.

As can be seen in a video that quickly went viral on Friday, NOS correspondent Sjoerd den Daas was reporting outside of the National Stadium in Beijing during the Olympics’ opening ceremony when he was stopped by a security guard and pushed out of frame.

Onze correspondent @sjoerddendaas werd om 12.00u live in het NOS Journaal door beveiligers voor de camera weggetrokken. Helaas is dit steeds vaker de dagelijkse realiteit voor journalisten in China. Hij is in orde en kon zijn verhaal gelukkig een paar minuten later afmaken pic.twitter.com/GLTZRlZV96

— NOS (@NOS) February 4, 2022

Though den Daas originally attempted to continue his report, he was soon pulled further out of frame. “We are now being pulled out of here,” den Daas said, according to a translation from Insider. “We have just been expelled from another area, so I’m afraid we’ll have to come back to you later.”

“Our correspondent @sjoerddendaas was pulled away from the camera by security guards at 12:00 pm live in the NOS Journaal,” a translation of the tweet reads. “Unfortunately, this is increasingly becoming a daily reality for journalists in China. He is fine and was able to finish his story a few minutes later.”

It is not immediately clear why den Daas was interrupted by the security guard.

During the Olympics, international reporters have been under strict protocols including daily COVID-19 testing and the use of a health monitoring app, according to Insider. In addition, several countries — including the U.S., U.K. and Canada — have declared a diplomatic boycott on the Beijing games citing human rights abuses, which China has denied.

In response to the U.S. boycott, China’s Foreign Ministry said the country “will pay a price for its erroneous actions,” according to the BBC.

In January, the Committee to Protect Journalists expressed concern about international reporters covering the Beijing Olympics.

“China has been the world’s worst jailer of journalists for three years running,” the CPJ wrote. “Domestic journalists in mainland China face increasing censorship and control while the international media are operating in a hostile environment.”

Earlier this week the Foreign Correspondents’ Club in Beijing published its annual report and survey into reporting conditions within China.

“The Chinese state continues to find new ways to intimidate foreign correspondents, their Chinese colleagues, and those whom the foreign press seeks to interview, via online trolling, physical assaults, cyber hacking, and visa denials,” the club said in its report.

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