[France24] Death of local girl prompts riots in SW China

2008.06.30

China has ordered "rioters" to surrender following violent protests by 10,000 residents of a southern county angry over the alleged rape and murder of a local girl, a dissident website said Monday.




Residents of the restive county of Weng'an in southwestern Guizhou province reported a tense calm Monday amid a heavy police presence two days after huge crowds attacked and burned government and police targets.




"There are many police in front of the county government building and police station. Students are going back to classes, social order is back to normal," a resident who gave only his surname, Lai, told AFP.




The incident comes at a sensitive time for China's Communist Party rulers as they seek to showcase the nation as harmonious and stable ahead of the Beijing Olympics in August.




The riots on Saturday were triggered by anger over the alleged rape and killing of a 15-year-old school girl amid reports that local officials were protecting the suspect, who has been identified as the son of the county's deputy chief.




The anger was further fuelled by the death in police custody of the girl's uncle after he protested the handling of the case, locals told AFP.




The state-run China Daily newspaper on Monday quoted officials as saying 10,000 protesters had taken to the streets due to "officials' alleged attempt to cover up a murder case of a girl student".




The dissident website Boxun.com featured a photo of a public notice ordering those involved in the rioting to turn themselves in.




Phone calls by AFP to the local police station went unanswered on Monday.




The Hong Kong-based Information Centre for Human Rights and Democracy said Sunday that more than 1,500 paramilitary and riot police had been dispatched to the area and that nearly 200 people had been arrested.




Although numerous Internet postings on the violence were seen over the weekend, few could be found Monday. The government's Internet censors typically block information on such clashes.




China sees thousands of such outbursts each year as ordinary Chinese, faced with an unresponsive legal system and rampant official corruption, lash out violently at perceived government abuses and graft.

Category:

News & Politics

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• France24
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• English
• China
• riots
• Guizhou
• weng'an
• province
• protests
• rape
• murder
• police
• coverup
• Communist
• party
• official

[EnglishOnly1]

Wow... at least the Chinese citizens have balls to stand up to THEIR government. Kudos to them.

[ivefantrance]

Yes yes everyone should worship CCP, smells like 1984, The CCP kind of have a Ministry of Love right now.

[jaymorpheus11]

They could go through 1,000 power outages + food shortages without breaking a sweat, 0 injuries that kinda thing.

[alamsamarendu]

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[Garlannd]

Gotta love China. Corruption and if you protest you die or disappear.

[diah4]

Yeah. I guess they feel the sacrifice is too great. There aren't many that would sacrifice their lives and freedom for somebody else. Selfishness and greed is nothing new here, though. I mean, there are people who are homeless and hungry, and others who are rich and wont throw them a dime.

Only ppl who have proven their loyalty to fight for the country are the soldiers, but they are taking orders from the leaders here. Going in circles.

[EnglishOnly1]

Yep, we'd have to have a lot, that's for sure. What amazes me is that no matter WHAT our Gov't does, nobody does anything... but when Michael Jackson dies, people show up at the hospital within minutes and stay for hours to find out his condition. Then they turn up by the thousands for the funeral. Would so many show up in minutes to learn the fate of our country? And would they stay for hours, would they attend the funeral of LADY LIBERTY? Truly a sad statement about our people, isn't it?

[diah4]

You gotta point there. We'd have to get ALOT of people together to fight off our police. There's power in numbers.

[loveinbabyCN]

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