This year's Nobel prize in literature winner, Mo Yan, who has been criticised for his membership in China's Communist party and reluctance to speak out against the country's government, has defended censorship as something as necessary as airport security checks.
He also suggested he won't join an appeal calling for the release of the jailed 2010 Peace prize laureate, Liu Xiaobo, a fellow writer and compatriot.
Mo has been criticised by human rights activists for not being a more outspoken defender of freedom of speech and for supporting the Communist party-backed writers' association, of which he is vice-president.