James Murdoch Resigns From News Publisher News Corp’s Board

US Sanctions 2 More Chinese Officials, Paramilitary Group for Human Rights Abuses in Xinjiang

The United States imposed sanctions on two more Chinese officials and one Chinese regime entity over human rights abuses against Uyghur Muslim minorities in the far-western region of Xinjiang. The Trump administration on July 31 announced sanctions on current and former Chinese Communist Party (CCP) officials heading the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps (XPCC), a regional paramilitary force under the Party, as well as the XPCC itself. The latest move builds upon sanctions issued earlier this month against four CCP officials—including a member of the CCP’s powerful Politburo Chen Quanguo—for their roles in overseeing the suppression in Xinjiang. The United Nations estimates that more than a million Uyghur Muslims have been detained in internment camps in the Xinjiang region. Survivors of the internment camps said they experienced torture, rape, and political indoctrination while…

News Corp founder Rupert Murdoch’s son James is resigning from the family-controlled publisher’s board over content appearing in its newspapers, which include the Wall Street Journal and the New York Post.

“My resignation is due to disagreements over certain editorial content published by the Company’s news outlets and certain other strategic decisions,” James Murdoch wrote Friday in a brief letter to News Corp’s board that the company made public. The resignation was effective Friday.

James is known as the more liberal Murdoch brother. His more conservative sibling, Lachlan, is the heir apparent to New Corp Executive Chairman Rupert and is co-chairman of News Corp. Lachlan is also executive chairman and CEO of Fox Corp, home to conservative news network Fox News, the Fox broadcast and sports networks and local TV stations.

James Murdoch at Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Frederick P. Rose Hall in New York, on April 19, 2017. (Andy Kropa/Invision/AP, File)

New York-based News Corp also publishes major papers in Australia and the U.K. and owns the HarperCollins book publisher.

In a statement provided by a News Corp spokesman, Rupert and Lachlan said, “We’re grateful to James for his many years of service to the company. We wish him the very best in his future endeavors.”

James has previously criticized News Corp’s editorial decisions and said he disagreed with Fox News coverage. In January, he and his wife, through a spokesperson, said they were disappointed with the denial of the link to climate change in coverage of Australia’s destructive wildfires in News Corp-owned papers in Australia.

More than 280 Wall Street Journal journalists and other staffers also recently sent a letter to the paper’s publisher criticizing the Opinion section, saying it published inaccuracies and undermined the paper with readers and sources.

James and Lachlan had shared power at 21st Century Fox, but the sale of much of the Fox entertainment business to Disney in 2019 saw James depart as CEO.

Focus News: James Murdoch Resigns From News Publisher News Corp’s Board

DOJ Takes Action Against Researchers in Connection With Their China Work

An American former professor was sentenced for concealing his participation in a Chinese state-run recruitment program, while a Chinese researcher pleaded guilty to stealing trade secrets from her employer in order to benefit China. The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) announced details of two separate cases on July 30. Dr. James Patrick Lewis, a former West Virginia University (WVU) professor, was sentenced to three months in prison for federal program fraud, while Chen Li pleaded guilty to stealing trade secrets from the Nationwide Children’s Hospital Research Institute in Ohio, for the benefit of herself and the Chinese communist regime. According to the DOJ, she applied to multiple Chinese state-run talent plans. For years, China’s central authorities and regional governments have rolled out talent recruitment programs, targeting promising overseas Chinese and…