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Thousands battle police in northwestern Chinese city

A local government’s decision to move its administrative headquarters from one city to another provoked two days of unrest in northwestern China, according to state media and witnesses, who said on Tuesday that protesters had burned police cars and looted government offices.

A local newspaper and Xinhua news agency said the skirmishes, in Longnan, a prefectural capital in southern Gansu Province, began on Monday and involved 2,000 people. Witnesses reached by phone, however, said the crowds had swelled to more than 10,000 and many of the protesters were still battling the police on Tuesday night.

Officials said more than 60 people were injured on Monday and Tuesday.

Although the state media did not fully explain the cause of the unrest, residents cited the plan to move the government offices. The move, they said, would lower real estate values and deprive Longnan of desperately needed jobs.

Riots are not uncommon in China, but as the economy slows, the government is acutely sensitive to unrest. Many disturbances are prompted by grievances over illegal land seizures or official malfeasance. But in recent months, as thousands of manufacturers have left the Pearl River Delta, jilted creditors and suppliers and unemployed workers have rampaged through empty warehouses and factories.

Last week, a confrontation involving thousands of people in the southern city of Shenzhen was ignited by the death of a motorcyclist who crashed after being hit by a walkie-talkie, which was thrown from a police checkpoint, witnesses said.

In recent weeks, there have been a number of high-profile taxi strikes across China prompted by low fares, rising costs and what drivers said was the collusion of corrupt officials and greedy fleet owners. The drivers, some of whom smashed the cabs of those who would not strike, relented after the government acceded to some of their demands.

In Longnan, residents said the disturbances were provoked by economic distress, rampant corruption and a lack of transparency in the local Communist Party.

Officials have said the decision to move the administrative headquarters from Longnan was based on the city’s location in a seismically unstable area. The earthquake that devastated parts of Sichuan in May, they point out, claimed more than 300 lives in Gansu, which borders Sichuan.
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