KEY POINTS:
Auckland's mainland Chinese community plan to protest next week against what they allege is "reporting of untruths" about Tibet by New Zealand's mainstream media.
Thousands have gone online, especially on the Chinese-language web forum skykiwi.com, to slam what they say is biased and unbalanced reporting by newspapers and television stations here on China's crackdown on the protests in Tibet, which started on March 10 - the 49th anniversary of a failed uprising against Beijing's rule.
"Now, many sick of the media trying to paint China black and are planning to take their message to the streets," said a reporter working for a local Chinese news service, who did not want to be named.
"Chinese views are not being reflected by the news media here at all, which seems dedicated to just reporting all things negative about China."
The reporter, who said he had been to Tibet three times since 1995, said he had witnessed "much progress with each visit" and felt the Tibetans had prospered under Chinese rule.
But this is a side of the story that is not told to the rest of the world - "especially in New Zealand".
There has been conflicting reports about what happened in Tibet, and Beijing is accusing the Dalai Lama, a Nobel Peace Prize winner, of masterminding the monk-led demonstrations in Lhasa and an anti-Chinese riot this month that Chinese authorities said killed 19.
The Dalai Lama, 72, has denied he is behind the unrest and his exiled government claims about 140 people have died in the violence.
Foreign journalists are finding it hard to justify the claims as the Chinese Government has barred them from entering the remote mountain region.
Auckland University research assistant Johnson Yuan, 22, says he has found hundreds of examples where news outlets were "cropping images and putting clips which were totally unrelated to the Tibet demonstration and then blaming China".
He claimed that "instead of showing a whole picture that includes rioters attacking the Chinese police, they would crop it such that it made the Chinese police look bad ...
"And also use images of violence in India and Nepal, saying those dark-skinned Indian police officers were Chinese officers attacking the monks."
Mr Yuan, who moved to New Zealand when he was aged 11, said he was worried that the result of such "distorted news" would be more negative generalisations, discrimination and racism against the Chinese here.
"The Chinese are not usually the type to organise marches and protests, but I think many are feeling that enough is enough."
