China calls its anti-crime campaign Strike Hard, and in its name hundreds -- 801 in a few weeks by one diplomat's count -- are being paraded forth at public rallies and then taken away and executed.
Those falling to the executioners' bullets include murderers, drug dealers and even people like Wu Wei, an insurance salesman who was shot for embezzling the equivalent of US$47,000.
PHOTO: REUTERS
Foreign critics fear that Chinese courts are being rushed to judgments, condemning people on possibly shaky evidence or even forced confessions. Judges have been ordered to try cases swiftly and punish crime severely.
"Miscarriages of justice have happened during Strike Hard, when police are under extreme pressure to be seen as performing," said Catherine Baber, a Hong Kong-based Amnesty International researcher monitoring China's use of the death penalty.
Human rights groups also fear Strike Hard is being used to tighten China's grip on Tibet and the restive western Muslim region of Xinjiang.
State media have reported mass arrests in both regions. Those sentenced in Xinjiang have included convicted separatists. Xinjiang television showed huge crowds at public sentencing rallies, with the condemned paraded on trucks before their execution.
Since 1983, there have been four Strike Hard campaigns in China, which in sheer numbers has long led the world in executions. After a five-year lull, the government recently renewed the campaign in the wake of a string of high-profile violent crimes, including apartment bombings that killed 108 people in the central city of Shijiazhuang in March.
The Communist Party hopes the campaign will shore up public confidence in its ability to keep crime rates under control. Chinese leaders regard executions as an effective deterrent to crime. The death penalty also enjoys widespread support among Chinese who feel their streets have grown less safe in two decades of economic reforms that have thrown millions out of work.
``The people and the government agree Strike Hard is a good way to ensure social order,'' said Ke Gezhuang, a criminal law expert at the Academy of Social Sciences in Shanghai.
Amnesty International and other human rights groups say more than 500 people have been executed since April 11.
A Western diplomat counted 801 deaths in the final three weeks of April alone -- basing his tally on reports in China's state-run media. He asked not to be named. China keeps nationwide execution figures a secret.
The campaign appears to be gaining steam. State media daily report new rounds of executions.
On a visit Wednesday to a provincial police station, the party's top law and order official, Luo Gan, "urged all localities to carry out the Strike Hard campaign ... and to severely and promptly punish the forces of evil," the government's Xinhua news agency said. But "it is strictly forbidden to use torture to extract confessions," he said.
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