China Cracks Down on Nobel Prize Security Ahead of Ceremony

BEIJING, Dec. 10, 2010— -- As today's Nobel Peace Prize ceremony gets underway, China is making no attempts to hide its feelings on the matter. "Today in Norway's Oslo, there will be a farce staged: 'The Trial of China'," was the headline of the Global Times. "Most nations' oppose peace prize to Liu," read the China Daily.

Since the prize was announced two months ago China has waged a campaign to discredit the award, and its recipient, jailed activist Liu Xiaobo. It has suspended trade with Norway and sent diplomats across the world to strong-arm other nations into boycotting the event.

"The Chinese government is not happy that Liu Xiaobo is receiving this award, and that was to be expected," Minky Warden, director of global initiatives at Human Rights Watch, told ABC News, "But the overreaction that we've seen from Beijing is really not worthy of a government that projects abroad as a strong, confident, growing, responsible power."

Restaurants have been told not to accept large reservations tonight, for fear that Liu's supporters may gather to celebrate his win. And the government has clamped down hard on media. The websites for BBC and CNN have been blocked since yesterday, and all television reports on Liu or the Nobel are blacked out by censors.

More worryingly, hundreds of people in China have been arrested, put under house arrest or blocked from leaving the country- measures designed to stop them from trying to attend today's ceremony or talk to international media.

Among them, is Liu Xia, the wife of Liu Xiaobao, who has not been seen or heard from in almost two months. When an ABC News crew visited the home where she is being held under house arrest yesterday, they found uniformed and plainclothes security forces guarding the area. Today, journalists have been penned into an area away from the complex.

It was one year ago that Liu Xiaobo was sentenced to 11 years in prison for co-authoring a pro-democracy manifesto, called Charter '08. But Liu has been a thorn in the side of Chinese authorities since his leading role in the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989.