Chinese rush to ‘occupy’ Obama’s re-election website
An apparent relaxation in China’s notoriously authoritarian internet regulations has seen thousands of Chinese flock to Barack Obama’s re-election campaign website.
The flurry of far eastern visitors is now apparent on the sites comment pages where many are now cryptically typed in Mandarin – to the bemusement of the sites target American audience.
A variety of motives are believed to lie behind the measure, with some making jocular attempts to secure green cards whilst others call on the President to assist them in gaining political freedom.
One user going by the name Wenbin Shang posted: “We have no chance to occupy our president Hu. He hates internet and has no account on any sns website, so we can just occupy Obama, forgive us ..."
The Chinese government currently blocks a range of popular websites which it deems to be offensive; including Facebook and Twitter which are believed to have fuelled protest movements in the Arab world and widespread looting in London.