Founding
On March 28, 1924, the Kuomintang Central Executive Committee decided to establish a news agency under the party's propaganda department[7] and required local party branches and members to provide news materials.[8] On April 1, CNA was founded in Guangzhou and began to distribute news wires as the Kuomintang Central Executive Committee Propaganda Department Agency.[8] When the Kuomintang government established its seat in Guangzhou on July 1, 1925, the agency became responsible for editing and distributing official documents and information from the party central committee; the number of daily dispatches increased from one per day to two to three a day.[8]
In 1927, the head of the Kuomintang propaganda department's publishing division, Yin Shuxian, became the director of the agency. The agency assumed responsibility for inspection and propaganda, which has been described as effectively serving as the party's news monitoring and censorship arm.[7]
When Chiang Kai-shek decided to expand the Kuomintang's news operation, he tasked Hsiao Tung-tzu, one of four "senior secretaries" of the party's propaganda department who had no experience in journalism, to reorganize the news agency. Hsiao proposed three changes: separate the agency from the Central Executive Committee and rename it to "Central News Agency", establish a professional radio news station, and allow the agency to gather news independently within the limits of the law and party regulations.[9]
Chiang agreed to the recommendations and appointed Hsiao as the director of the newly-formed CNA in 1932. The agency moved out of the Kuomintang headquarters in Dingjiaqiao, Nanjing to three longtang buildings on Shoukang Lane in Xinjiekou.[9]
In 1936, CNA established its first bureau outside China in Tokyo with journalist Chen Bosheng as Sino-Japanese relations continued to deteriorate before the Second Sino-Japanese War. By 1937, CNA had 10 bureaus, 21 correspondents, and 159 Chinese-language newspapers that subscribed to its wire service.[10] During the Second Sino-Japanese War, commercial newspapers relied heavily on CNA wires, including Chinese Communist Party-owned Xinhua Daily, which nearly 89% of its content originated from CNA.[11] The agency's scale and financial support from the Kuomintang during a wartime economic downturn also caused privately owned competitors, including Kuowen News Agency,[10] to close.[11]
In Taiwan
After the Kuomintang took control of Taiwan following Japan's surrender in 1945, CNA Taiwan Correspondent Yeh Ming-hsun flew to Taipei to take over the bureaus and news operation of Dōmei Tsushin, the state news agency of the Empire of Japan.[12] The agency's headquarters were relocated to Taipei in 1949 during the retreat of the government of the Republic of China to Taiwan at the end of the Chinese Civil War. On October 2, 1950, longtime Kuomintang propaganda official Tseng Hsu-pai became the first CNA director in Taiwan.[13]
Despite the corporatization of the agency in 1973, it continued to receive heavy government subsidies, and remained Taiwan's official agency. At the time, CNA journalists received preferential treatment on various occasions, mostly government-related press conferences. After Chiang Ching-kuo became president, he brought media leaders closer to the Kuomintang by appointing them to the party's central standing committee. Tsao Sheng-fen, the president of CNA, Central Daily News and China Daily News, was joined the committee in 1981.[14]
Non-profit corporation
On 1 July 1996, the agency became a state-run non-profit organization under a bill passed by the Legislative Yuan.[16] Although CNA was no longer operated by the Kuomintang, it was still subject to political influence by the ruling party.[14] During the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) administration of President Chen Shui-bian, the government appointed people of Taiwanese origin to leadership positions of CNA, which prompted editorial changes that de-emphasized the Chinese identity in Taiwan, including the use of the term "Taiwan-U.S. relations" instead of "Chinese-U.S. relations" used previously.[14] Under Chen's successor, the Kuomintang's Ma Ying-jeou, CNA reverted to the use of "China" to refer to Taiwan.[14]
From 2005–2010, CNA's web traffic in Taiwan lagged behind other local, and even mainland Chinese, outlets.[17]
