Protests in China


Internal pressures are building
The human spirit is amazing. Squeeze hard enough, and tyranny creates the very thing that it fears. We don't often get more than a glimpse of what is happening in China, but this is one of those glimpses.

In the midst of an economic expansion that is the envy of the world, there is one particular growth industry in China over which the country's stability-obsessed leaders are greatly distressed: the protest industry, especially the rapidly increasing incidence of large-scale protests. A few instances from the last 15 months:

* On October 18, 2004, in the southwestern province of Sichuan, a government official's altercation with a street vendor sparked a night of violent clashes between police and an angry crowd that, according to eyewitnesses interviewed by Radio Free Asia, numbered in the thousands. Paramilitary units were eventually sent in to restore order.

* Also in Sichuan province, on November 3, 2004, authorities dispatched paramilitary troops to quell a protest that lasted several days and involved more than 10,000 peasants, angry over what they viewed as inadequate compensation by the government for land to be used for a hydroelectric project.

* In August 2005, in the eastern province of Zhejiang, more than 1,000 paramilitary troops moved in on thousands of protesting villagers who had demanded the closure of a polluting battery factory that they said was responsible for the high level of lead content in their children's blood.

These "sudden incidents" or "mass incidents," in official parlance, are presenting Chinese officials with a serious problem that goes beyond the negative image of China they project to the outside world. The sheer numbers are noteworthy. In August 2005, the country's public security minister, Zhou Yongkang, announced that some 74,000 such events had taken place in 2004, an increase from 58,000 the year before. According to Zhou, 17 of the 74,000 involved more than 10,000 people, 46 involved more than 5,000 people, and 120 involved more than 1,000 participants. But many believe the actual figures are higher.

There aren't that many things that can encourage a revolution. But when they believe they have less to lose by acting than by not acting, well, the fuse just got lit. It's getting harder and harder to keep secrets.

— NeoWayland

Posted: Sat - January 28, 2006 at 04:35 AM  Tag


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