Harald Maass, correspondent for the German daily Frankfurter Rundschau, was harassed after arriving in Lhasa in April to do a story on Mount Everest climbers — along with an accompanying colleague, a photographer and the local people whom they had contacted.
Maass was prevented by police from going to the city of Shigatse to do his story, while interview subjects in Lhasa, as well as a travel agency he had hired a car from, were heavily fined and warned not to talk to him.
Maass was summoned by the Foreign Ministry on May 15 and strongly criticized for his trip. A ministry official told Maass to “correct his mistakes.”