China police move to deter zero-Covid
demonstrations and trace protesters
One arrested as police reportedly demand information
from Beijing protester, while show of force largely prevents fresh
demonstrations
Helen
Davidson in Taipei
@heldavidson
Tue 29 Nov
2022 02.40 GMT
Police have
been out in force in China to stamp out zero-Covid protests and at least one
person was arrested, according to social media videos, after a show of civil
disobedience unprecedented since president Xi Jinping assumed power a decade
ago.
There were
also reports some demonstrators have been interrogated by authorities over the
phone after attending the rare street gatherings in cities across the country.
The arrest
was reportedly made in the city of Hangzhou late on Monday. Videos on social
media, which could not be independently verified, showed hundreds of police
occupying a large public square on Monday night, preventing people from
congregating.
One video
showed police, surrounded by a small crowd of people holding smartphones,
making an arrest while others tried to pull back the person being detained.
Hangzhou police did not immediately reply to a request for comment.
In Shanghai
and Beijing, police could be seen on Tuesday morning still patrolling areas of
the cities where some groups on the Telegram social media app had suggested
people should gather again. Their presence on Monday evening and throughout the
night ensured no more gatherings took place.
There were
reports of police asking people for their phones to check if they had virtual
private networks (VPNs) and the Telegram app, which has been used by weekend
protesters. VPNs are illegal for most people in China, while the Telegram app
is blocked from China’s internet.
People were
also sharing instructions on Telegram about how to keep phone data safe from
random police checks, including apps or settings to quickly clear data. “What
to do if your phone is stolen or taken by the police - this little guide may
prevent unpleasant situations down the road,” one message read.
In
Shanghai, near a site of weekend protests, bar staff told news agency AFP they
had been ordered to close at 10:00pm local time for “disease control”. Small
clusters of officers stood outside each metro exit.
Throughout
the day AFP journalists saw officers detaining four people, later releasing
one.
“The
atmosphere tonight is nervy. There are so many police around,” a man in his
early 30s said as evening fell.
In Beijing,
hundreds of mostly young people braved icy temperatures to gather near a
riverbank in the capital on Sunday evening, as a vigil for victims of a deadly
apartment blaze in north-western China’s Xinjiang region turned into calls to
end zero-Covid.
A woman
protester told AFP that by Monday evening she and five of her friends who
attended the protest had received phone calls from Beijing police, demanding
information about their movements.
In one
case, a police officer visited her friend’s home after they refused to answer
their phone.
“He said my
name and asked me whether I went to the Liangma river last night ... he asked
very specifically how many people were there, what time I went, how I heard
about it,” she told AFP, asking to stay anonymous.
“The police
stressed that last night’s protest was an illegal assembly, and if we had
demands then we could submit them through the regular channels.”
She said
that the police officer was mostly “even-toned” during the brief call and urged
her not to attend future events.
“I had
previously prepared for this, but of course I was still agitated,” she said,
adding she would “try her best to continue” attending similar protests in the
future, and “prepare better” next time. “I never thought that this kind of
civil society activity could ever happen in China,” she said.
It is not
clear how police discovered the identities of some protesters and the vast majority
of those at Sunday’s rally did not have their ID documents checked by police,
an AFP journalist saw.
Asked about
widespread anger over China’s zero-Covid policy, foreign ministry spokesman
Zhao Lijian told reporters: “What you mentioned does not reflect what actually
happened.
“We believe
that with the leadership of the Communist party of China, and cooperation and
support of the Chinese people, our fight against Covid-19 will be successful.”
Inside
China, the government and state media have maintained silence on the protests
but their awareness is apparent. Tuesday’s newspapers carried several items on
zero-Covid, including an editorial in Xinhua acknowledging that the pandemic
“has had some impact on social production and life”.
“In the
face of complex changes in the pandemic, all localities and departments must be
more patient and relieve the emotions of the people,” it said.
On Monday,
smaller demonstrations spilled over outside mainland China. Dozens of
protesters gathered in Hong Kong’s central business district, the scene of
sometimes-violent anti-government demonstrations in 2019. Expatriate dissidents
and students staged small-scale vigils and protests in cities around the world
including London, Paris, Tokyo and Sydney.
US
president Joe Biden is closely monitoring unrest in China by protesters, the
White House said on Monday. National security council spokesman John Kirby
would not describe Biden’s reaction to the protesters’ demands but said the
president supported their rights.
“People
should be allowed the right to assemble and to peacefully protest policies or
laws or dictates that that they take issue with,” Kirby said.
Britain’s
prime minister Rishi Sunak warned that China posed a “systemic challenge” to UK
values and interests, as his government condemned the reported beating of the
BBC reporter.
Sunak said
the so-called “golden era” of UK-China relations trumpeted by former prime
minister David Cameron was “over, along with the naive idea that trade would
automatically lead to social and political reform.”
Since
Friday, a wave of protests spread across multiple cities in China, prompted by
the death of 10 people in a building fire in Urumqi in Xinjiang. Much of the
region had been under lockdown for more than three months, and people blamed
the lockdown for the deaths.
The
protests have demonstrated a growing frustration and scepticism with the ruling
Communist party’s commitment to zero-Covid. Xi’s government has pursued a
policy of lockdowns, repeated testing of millions of people and lengthy
quarantines for overseas arrivals in an attempt to limit spread.
A series of
incidents related to the enforcement of the policy, including a bus crash that
killed 27 people being taken to quarantine, and numerous suicides and other
deaths linked to lockdowns and restrictions, have tested people’s tolerance.
Agence
France-Presse and Reuters contributed to this report
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