By: A newspaper cartoonist said on Thursday he will pay more attention to public sentiment after his drawing of a weeping President Hu Jintao prompted an outcry on the Internet. But he denied reports that he was suspended from his job.
The drawing on Monday in the News Express in the southern city of Guangzhou was a rarity for China's media, which almost never shows its communist leaders in cartoons. It depicted Hu with tears streaming down his face as he wrote to the daughter of a university professor who died of overwork. He clutched a handkerchief in one of his hands.
Cartoonist Kuang Biao said the drawing drew angry criticism on Internet bulletin boards. No such comments were visible on Thursday, suggesting that Web sites might have removed them.
"I will spend a month in 'self-reflection,'" Kuang said by phone from Guangzhou. "I will pay more attention in future."
Kuang, who was worked for the paper since 2000, denied news reports that that he was suspended from his job for a month in punishment. People who answered the phone at the paper's management office wouldn't give any other information.
A man who answered the phone at the Communist Party propaganda office for Guangdong province, where Guangzhou is located, said he wasn't aware of Kuang's case. The man wouldn't give his name.
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