When two world leaders were caught on a hot mic having a bizarre conversation about living forever, the news agency Reuters realized it was a big story.<\/p>\n
Reuters reported on and aired the footage of Russia\u2019s Vladimir Putin and China\u2019s Xi Jinping discussing organ transplantation as a means of life extension and perhaps immortality during a September 3 Victory Day Parade in China, a procession celebrating the end of the Second Sino-Japanese War.<\/p>\n
But two days later, Reuters yanked the video off its website, retracted the footage from its wire service, and erased clips from its social media feeds.<\/p>\n
The reason: a takedown letter from a China Central Television, China\u2019s state-controlled television network, which had licensed footage of the event to Reuters.<\/p>\n
Last Friday, CCTV lawyer HE Danning wrote to Reuters demanding the video be taken down. \u201cThe editorial treatment applied to this material has resulted in a clear misrepresentation of the facts and statements contained within the licensed feed.\u201d<\/p>\n
Reuters, whose parent company Thomson Reuters conducts a variety of business operations in China, complied.<\/p>\n
\u201cReuters removed the video from its website and issued a \u2018kill\u2019 order to its clients on Friday,\u201d the media company wrote<\/a> in a statement published on its website, explaining its decision to withdraw the footage from a portal used by other news organizations that rely on Reuters as a wire service.<\/p>\n The initial Reuters article<\/a> about the hot mic moment now contains a note that \u201cstory has been corrected to withdraw videos, with no changes to text.\u201d<\/p>\n Reuters didn\u2019t just remove the full four-minute event video from its systems, but also a 38-second annotated clip of the exchange that it had previously posted across its social media platforms, including TikTok<\/a>, Facebook<\/a>, and LinkedIn<\/a>. A Reuters World News podcast episode<\/a>, which features a short audio clip of the exchange, is still online.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Footage of the event remains online elsewhere \u2014 but not all clips capture the conversation between Xi and Putin as clearly as the Reuters recording. A version<\/a> of the event footage on CCTV\u2019s official YouTube channel includes audio of an announcer speaking and music playing, obscuring the conversation about life extension between Xi and Putin.<\/p>\n In the version of the video Reuters posted to TikTok (and later deleted), Xi and Putin stroll around like old chums as they discuss, through translators, \u201cimmortality in a conversation caught on a hot mic,\u201d as Reuters summarized in the opening title card.\u00a0<\/p>\n During the conversation, as seen in the Reuters clip, Xi says: \u201cIn the past people rarely lived longer than 70 years, but today they say that at 70 you are still a child.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHuman organs can be continuously transplanted. The longer you live, the younger you become and even achieve immortality.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n The Russian state-funded outlet RT later posted<\/a> Bloomberg\u2019s version of the video<\/a>, which remains online and features a similar translation of Xi\u2019s remarks over the same 38-second sequence, which Bloomberg credits to CCTV\u2019s \u201clive transmission\u201d of the parade; RT\u2019s thread also featured an English-dubbed video of Putin confirming the exchange at a press conference.<\/p>\n Putin responds, \u201cHuman organs can be continuously transplanted. The longer you live, the younger you become and even achieve immortality.\u201d Xi then says, \u201cSome predict this century humans may live up to 150 years old.\u201d<\/p>\n In a statement, Reuters expressed that they \u201cstand by the accuracy of what we published\u201d and that \u201cwe have carefully reviewed the published footage, and we have found no reason to believe Reuters longstanding commitment to accurate, unbiased journalism has been compromised.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cReuters withdrew these videos because it no longer held the legal permission to publish this copyrighted material, and as a global news agency, we are committed to respecting the intellectual property rights of others,\u201d Reuters spokesperson Heather Carpenter told The Intercept.<\/p>\n We\u2019re independent of corporate interests \u2014 and powered by members. Join us. <\/p>\n Join Our Newsletter <\/p>\n Thank You For Joining! <\/p>\n \n Original reporting. Fearless journalism. Delivered to you. <\/p>\n Will you take the next step to support our independent journalism by becoming a member of The Intercept?\n <\/p>\n By signing up, I agree to receive emails from The Intercept and to the Privacy Policy<\/a> and Terms of Use<\/a>.<\/p>\n Thomson Reuters, headquartered in Toronto, engages in an assortment of business ventures in China<\/a>, such as an AI-based legal \u201cco-counsel<\/a>\u201d bot, \u201cglobal trade solutions<\/a>,\u201d and legal research on Chinese law through its Westlaw product. The company maintains several offices in China, including in Shanghai, Beijing, and a Reuters news bureau in Shenzhen<\/a>. The news organization is currently hiring for a researcher<\/a> position at its Beijing bureau.<\/p>\n Reuters did not respond specifically when asked if its business interests played any interest in complying with the removal request.<\/p>\n This isn\u2019t the first time Reuters has taken down content at the behest of international authorities. In 2023, Reuters published an expos\u00e9<\/a> about the Indian cyber-espionage firm Appin. An Indian court deemed the article to be \u201cindicative of defamation\u201d and ordered that the article be removed. As the Freedom of the Press Foundation highlighted<\/a>, even though Indian courts don\u2019t have jurisdiction outside of India, Reuters removed the article not just in India but also worldwide. Once the injunction expired, Reuters reinstated the article.<\/p>\n\n
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