BEIJING: Hundreds of villagers in southern China clashed with police after about 1,000 officers were sent to break up demonstrations against land requisitions, residents said yesterday.
Several people were hospitalised after being beaten by regular and military police, a villager said, adding that many more were suffering lesser injuries.
Police in Zhongshan city, Guangdong province, confirmed that the protests started on Wednesday but refused to elaborate.
“Yes, it happened. But we are not sure about the number of people involved,” a duty officer surnamed Chen said. He refused to comment on whether police had broken up the demonstrations.
Various accounts from villagers put the number of protestors between 1,000 and 3,000 at the peak of the demonstrations earlier this week.
A villager, who declined to be named, said the numbers quickly dwindled after police armed with batons started beating people.
“Now people are too scared to go,” another villager said. “There are so many police about. They are armed with batons.” She said on Friday night there had still been more than 100 people protesting.
Villagers had started a sit-in protest outside the Sanjiao township government over inadequate compensation for farmland forcibly taken from them. When their pleas went unanswered, they had started blocking a motorway.
“That used to be our land, so it was reasonable for villagers to re-occupy their own land,” said another villager, who also declined to be named.
“People are so angry,” he said. “People have hardly enough to live on and the local officials have millions (of yuan) in their own accounts.”
Villagers said the local government had started selling their farmland to companies more than 10 years ago but had given each villager just $49 to 86 per year in compensation.
They said they had put up with it for years but that the money was not enough to live on with the rapid price rises in China over recent years.
“How can we live on that in this day and age?” she said. “We are unskilled farmers, we can’t find proper jobs.”
One of the residents said his family used to own three “mu” of farmland (0.2 hectares), on which they grew sugar cane and vegetables. But the government had sold their land for 100,000 to 200,000 yuan per mu.
“As a citizen in this society, we have a duty to obey the government, but things are just getting ridiculous,” he said. “What choice do we have now?”
An elderly villager surnamed Chen said that police had set up road blocks around the village and were barring outsiders from entering.
A staff member at the village government said the incident was over.
“It was just a small argument,” he said. “It has already been dealt with.”–AFP |
