Girl's death sparks rioting in China: reports (violent riot: video and photos)

Reuters ^ | 06/28/08 | Chris Buckley

[TigerLikesRooster]

Girl's death sparks rioting in China: reports

By Chris Buckley

Sat Jun 28, 3:50 PM ET

Rioters torched a police building and vehicles in southwest China on Saturday, in unrest triggered by allegations of a cover-up over a girl's death, according to Chinese accounts on the Internet.

The reports of the clash in Weng'an County, Guizhou province, could not be immediately verified and government and police did not answer phone calls in the early hours of Sunday.

But the accounts spreading on the Internet, despite China's state censorship, depicted a violent outburst involving thousands of people and lasting several hours.

[TigerLikesRooster]

Video Footages of Riot

http://tw.youtube.com/watch?v=BukWSNBBKdM

http://tw.youtube.com/watch?v=V668sBWnFO8

http://tw.youtube.com/watch?v=jalRKhSsUKk

http://tw.youtube.com/watch?v=I3dqK7-__3M

http://tw.youtube.com/watch?v=h8Ign9Zg00E

Pictures of Riot

    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    

[TigerLikesRooster]

Ping!

[REDWOOD99]

Wow!!! That is an amazing report. Thank you for those pics.

[nuconvert]

WoW

[Ratblaster]

This pre-olympic moment is brought to you by: The People's Liberation Army. 80 Years of Good Times

[TigerLikesRooster]

brought to you by: The People's Liberation Army.

Don't leave out Paramilitary Police and Ministry of State Security. The Last and not the least, Chinese Communist Party(CCP.)

[PhilDragoo]

Unlike June 3-4, 1989, when PLA shot down unarmed students, ran them over with tracked vehicles, now there are many cameras.

Made in China.

Hahaha.

[TigerLikesRooster]

Getting rich and affording to field expensive war toys have its downside.:-)

[Tainan]

Pack mentality. Rumor riots are a fact of life among the Chinese.

[TigerLikesRooster]

Mostly rumors about abuse of power and corruption by officials.

[Global2010]

Wow.

So all this time and effort the Chinese govt has spent on proper cheering lessons for the public and now the outrage from corupt murderous cover up of a teen.

Cant rope in human emotions.
Good for them to show the outrage and the ineternet too for getting the pictures out to the world.

The article makes it seem like the Chinese govt is more concerned about good mannered sheeple for the Olympics.

Good reportig Tiger esp for those of us or perhaps I am the only one who does not have access to UTUBE.

[Steve Van Doorn]

Things are heating up.
thank you

[dr_who]

Interesting times.

[Steve Van Doorn]

Google maps didn’t have this location. So I looked here:
http://www.maplandia.com/china/guizhou/weng-an/

[gogov]

You’ve seen this scene in Western cities a bunch of times - just see what happens when someone’s team loses - and you are amazed by the sight of this pictures.

What exactly is your impression of China. They do have protests. Granted, not over political issues, but over econmic ones, corruption, and other perceived injustices.

What am I missing?

[Prophet in the wilderness]

The Chinese Government can't afford a Tienanmen Square incident this close to the 2008 Olympics or any kind of rise up...

[TigerLikesRooster]

Time to import "robotic" N. Korean crowds who cheer on cue and play well-behaving pedestrians. :-)

Actually, that is what Chinese regime will do. They will select loyal robots(from little kids to old folks) and deploy them on streets and at stadium. They have no other choice.

As for foreign tourists, many will be those from multinational corporations operating in China. Those "company crowds" will put up happy faces, too.

[Ronin]

I am convinced that by now the ChiComs are deeply regretting their decision to host the Olympics.

It’s going to get worse too.

[Caipirabob]

This is in an area pretty far from Beijing. The Chinese dictators shouldn't have any problem isolating the problem so that it doesn't impact the olympics. That's really all they care about.

[potlatch]

[Hahaha.]

Never thought I’d see such a simple word from you, lol!
Yes, the camera phones have their pros and their cons. Probably many more good things than the few who use them badly.

[Tainan]

Some further info on the rioting mentioned in the OP:

Another story about the rioting

[TigerLikesRooster]

I will post the entire account here. Readers should be the judge.

Link: http://zonaeuropa.com/200806c.brief.htm#032

[032] Yet Another Version of the Weng’an Mass Incident (06/30/2008) (Boxun)

The name of the female student victim was Li Shufen. She was 15 years old and she was a resident of Yuhua town. At around 6pm on June 21, Li Shufen was asked to go out by her classmate Wang Jiao. Li was raped by two young men who killed her and tossed her body into the Simen river. At some time past 11pm that night, some people heard cries for help. At around 12:30am, Wang Jiao called the elder brother of Li Shufen to report that Li Shufen “had committed suicide by jumping into the river.”

Li Shufen’s elder brother and others went down by the river and saw Wang Jiao standing by the bridge with two men. They found that there was no water in Li's stomach. Given that Li had given no indication of suicidal tendency, they took the three people down to the police station. But at 10am the next morning, the three people were released unconditionally without any interrogation or statement-taking. The police also said that the victim had died by “suicide.”

The next day, someone told the relatives of Li Shufen that she had been raped, killed and thrown into the river. The police did not conduct an autopsy and ignored the request from the family to do so. Based upon information provided by local citizens, the Li family found out that Wang Jiao and the two young men were related to the leaders of the county public security bureau, county party committee and provincial party committee. That was why they were released after being detained only eight hours.

On Monday, the forensic doctor said that the cause of death was ‘suicide.’ The family went to petition at the country party committee office. Li Shufen’s uncle who is a teacher at the Yuhua Middle School was assaulted by six plainclothes security guards and subsequently died from the injuries. Li Shufen’s aunt was also beaten unconscious. Meanwhile, the parents of Li Shufen guarded the coffin by the Simen river.

According to the godfather of Li Shufen, “The public security bureau sent out people to try to steal the corpse to force a quick interment. When the family relatives refused, they were assaulted. The country mayor and the public security bureau all wanted a quick interment. Many people are on the site ready to defend the corpse. The corpse had been retrieved from the water by the family, but the public security bureau wanted them to say that the fire department retrieved it.”

This tragic incident has aroused the anger of the local residents. The students from four Weng’an middle schools went down to the public security office to petition. The police used force to suppress them, which caused the students and other citizens to set fire to the public security bureau office and more than a dozen police vehicles. The police officers were trapped in the office building, and police reinforcements had to be summoned from elsewhere.

According to Mrs. Liu: “The students went to the government office with protest banners but nobody paid them any attention. Then they went down to the public security bureau building, where the police attacked them with electric prods. The students and the supporting citizens set fire to the dozens of police vehicles as well as the offices.”

On this day, several tens of thousand of citizens assembled and protested in front of the public security bureau office, the county government building and the Civic Affairs Bureau building. They set fire to the public security, county government and county party committee buildings.

Mr. Wang who participated in the action said, “The county mayor and the public security bureau director were all in hiding. Several hundred anti-riot policemen were stuck in the building and did not dare to come out. The fire department people were blocked by the people from going in to put out the fires. This time, they saw the power of the people. They learned that when people are not afraid to die, then death cannot be used to threaten them!”

[ESWN Comment: The story above is unverified. Nevertheless this is the most popular story spread around the Internet. A competitive alternative with the rape angle has Wang Jiao taking revenge because Li Shufen refused to pass tips to her during an exam. The big problem here is this.

First, it is known from the photos and videos that a mass incident had occurred in Weng’an county.

Secondly, all mainstream media have been ordered to carry the Xinhua story:

According to the local police, on the afternoon of June 28, certain people were dissatisfied with the inquest on the cause of death for a female students and congregated at the county government and public security bureau offices. During the process of reception by the relevant government officials, certain people instigated the masses who did not know the truth to attack the county public security bureau, county government and county party offices. A small number of criminal elements vandalized the offices and set fire to many offices and vehicles.

Afterwards, the principal leaders of the Guiyang provincial party committee and government issued orders for the matter to be quickly and properly handled. Guiyang provincial Party Standing Committee member, Politics and Law Committee secretary and Public Security Bureau director Cui Yadong arrived at the scene to direct the local party committee and government to calm things down. At around 2am on June 29, the spectators slowly dispersed and the incident did not become bigger. Calm has basically been restored in Weng’an county.

The Xinhua story does not satisfy the need to know the truth. It only created many more doubts. This opened up the space for all sorts of rumors to dominate public opinion which cannot be fully blocked anymore at this time.

[Free Vulcan]

Thanks for the heads up.

[Tainan]

Well posted. I didn't want to 'hijack' yer thread.
That site is a good one to keep up with the hijinks going on in the PRC. It gets a lot of quick on-the-spot-commentary and cell-phone pics and videos that would otherwise not be seen.

[editor-surveyor]

Get ready for the tanks; Tianamin Square II !!

[compound w]

I am actually in China right now. Obviously, this is not making the national news. The video links above are blocked to me, but I’m able to access them through back doors.

(Strange as it may seem, I have no problem accessing FR, and I can also access all Taiwan news sites.)