Sat, Mar 04, 2006 page4

• Police throng Tiananmen before NPC

  CORDONS Many people entering the square face security checks, while scores of activists are being detained or kept away from the capital

  • AGENCIES
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  China is flooding Tiananmen Square with police ahead of tomorrow's opening of the annual session of parliament and rounding up people the government fears might disrupt proceedings.

  Vans with blacked-out windows and antennae cruised the square, which will be closed to tourists for many days over the next two weeks.

  Almost 15,000 police will be on patrol to maintain "social stability," and cars with non-Beijing number plates will need special permission to enter the capital, state media reported.

  

  Police officers perform security checks on vehicles on Tiananmen Square prior to the opening ceremony of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing yesterday. The advisory body's meeting came two days before the opening of the National People's Congress' annual session.

  PHOTO: AP

  Police were also encouraging those with no work or resident documents to leave Beijing, although they denied it was a clean-up campaign. They said they had set no targets for the number of people to be asked to leave the city.

  "For undocumented people with no fixed income who have lived in the city for a long time, we will round them up and encourage them to return [home] to reduce threats to social order," said police spokesman Xu Hu, quoted by the Beijing News.

  The government is also detaining political and health activists and warning others not to protest, activists and human-rights groups said yesterday.

  Thousands of people visit Beijing each year during the 10-day National People's Congress (NPC) session, hoping to air complaints about corruption and other problems. Police routinely detain them and send them home.

  This year, those detained or warned include AIDS patients who want better medical care and people who have petitioned the government over the loss of their homes for redevelopment.

  Liu Xinjuan (劉新娟), an activist who has complained about homes being demolished without proper compensation, was sent home to Shanghai from Beijing and forced into a mental hospital, said New York-based Human Rights in China.

  A woman who answered the phone at Shanghai's Minxin Mental Health Center confirmed yesterday that Liu was there.

  The woman, who identified herself only by the surname Zhang, refused to give details about Liu's case or say when she would be released.

  Police and soldiers patrolled the square, while officers stationed at all the entrances to the square checked the identities and bags of many visitors, especially those who appeared to be from out of town.

  In a side street off one end of the square, a line of police cars carrying plain clothes officers sat parked near a small office where people from all over China flock to present petitions about perceived injustices.

  "Let me go! Let me go!" yelled one woman dressed all in black, as a security guard blocked her entry and threw aside her crutches.

  Other petitioners did not even make it to the capital.

  Zhang Jianting, confined to a wheelchair since being knocked down by what he says was a government car 10 years ago, said police outside his home in Jiangsu Province had prevented him from travelling to Beijing to demand compensation.

  "It's like this every time there's a meeting of parliament," he told Reuters by telephone with a sigh. "They talk about protecting human rights, but that's a bit of a joke, isn't it?

  "I'm in a wheelchair and can hardly move. I'm not really a threat to social stability," he said.
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