3rd Chinese film pulled from Melbourne festival amid backlash over Uighur activist

3rd Chinese film pulled from Melbourne festival

HONG KONG — A third Chinese director has pulled his movie from an Australian film festival after two other filmmakers backed out to protest the planned appearance of the exiled Uighur activist Beijing blames for inciting recent ethnic violence.

Rebiya Kadeer’s scheduled visit to the Melbourne International Film Festival on Aug. 8 has already prompted Venice Film Festival winner Jia Zhangke and Hong Kong director Emily Tang to withdraw their movies.

Advertising agency Wieden and Kennedy Shanghai said in a statement on its Web site Thursday that it has pulled its short documentary “YB Box” from the Melbourne event.

“Director Liu Feng expressed his strong determination to pull out of the festival after returning to the company on Monday morning after his vacation,” the statement said. The statement did not mention Kadeer.

The festival also announced on its Web site the 27-minute film about three human beatbox rappers from the northeastern Chinese province of Jilin won’t be screening but didn’t say why.

Spokeswomen for Wieden and Kennedy Shanghai and the Melbourne festival didn’t immediately respond to calls and e-mails from The Associated Press seeking comment.

Kadeer, 62, is scheduled to attend a question-and-answer session after a screening of “10 Conditions of Love” — a documentary about her life — on Aug. 8.

The Melbourne festival has been besieged by objections to Kadeer’s appearance. Jia said her presence will turn the festival into a political event.

Festival director Richard Moore said an official from the Chinese consulate in Melbourne asked him to pull the film about three weeks ago. The festival’s Web site was also hacked — an attack Moore blames on his refusal to scrap the Kadeer film or her visit.

Jia pulled his 19-minute short “Cry Me a River” and Tang withdrew her feature film “Perfect Life.”

In the country’s worst unrest in decades, protests by minority Uighurs descended into communal violence, with Uighur and Han Chinese groups beating one another in the streets of Urumqi, the capital of western Xinjiang province.The Chinese government says 197 people died and more than 1,700 were wounded.

On Wednesday, Kadeer said in Japan that 10,000 Uighur protesters had disappeared after the riots, and she demanded an international investigation.

On the Net:

Melbourne International Film Festival: www.melbournefilmfestival.com.au