MCLC: attempted mass suicide

[Denton, Kirk]

MCLC LIST
From: kirk (denton.2 at osu.edu)
Subject: attempted mass suicide
***********************************************************

Source: The Telegraph (7/17/14):
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/10972857/Chinese-prote
stors-attempt-mass-suicide-in-bid-for-justice.html

Chinese protestors attempt mass suicide in bid for justice
Twelve petitioners try to kill themselves in Beijing in a desperate
attempt to publicise injustices they claim to have suffered at the hands
of Communist Party officialsPetitioners lie on the pavement outside
offices of China Youth Daily, with documents scattered around them
By Tom Phillips

Twelve Chinese protestors are being treated in hospital after attempting
to draw attention to alleged government abuses by taking their own lives.

In two separate mass suicide bids, petitioners from the provinces of
Guizhou and Jiangsu this week travelled to Beijing to make their dramatic
protests.

At around 8.10am on Wednesday morning seven petitioners drank pesticide
outside the headquarters of China Youth Daily, a state-run newspaper.

A photograph showed the victims – two women and five men – lying on the
pavement outside the newspaper, with documents scattered around them.

Chen Xinguo, one of the group, told the Chinese magazine Caijing he had
swallowed pesticide to protest the forced demolition of his home in the
city of Qingyang in Jiangsu.

Four of the seven remain in life threatening condition, according to the
state-run People’s Daily newspaper.

Qin Zeying, the wife of one of the group, 58-year-old Cai Fuxi, said she
had not been aware of her husband’s plans but hinted that she supported
them.

“We had no other option but to resort to this to make ourselves heard. We
have lost our house. We have lost everything,” she told The Telegraph.
“We’ve been driven to homelessness. We’ve been driven into a corner – the
government gave us no way out.”

Ms Qin said her husband, who she believes is now “out of danger”, had
dedicated his life to obtaining compensation after the family home was
demolished.

He had previously travelled to Nanjing, the provincial capital, to
protest, she said. There, he was detained and thrown into an illegal
“black jail” where, for three days, he had “no food, no sleep and not even
a drop of water to drink”. “All my husband wants is to get an answer,” she
added.

In a separate incident, five petitioners from Guizhou province in
southwest China also attempted to kill themselves in protest after being
detained by police.

“They drank the pesticide and fell to the floor,” a witness named only as
Ms Zhu told Radio Free Asia, the US-funded news group.
Ms Zhu said she had unsuccessfully tried to talk to one of the
petitioners, in order to publicise their case.

“She said a couple of things, and then white foam started coming out of
her mouth and she fainted away."

“When they fell to the floor, all the petitioners gathered round and
started shouting, but the police corralled us and wouldn't let us see,"
Zhu added.

"One policeman saw me taking photos and dragged me into an office where he
snatched my cell phone and deleted the photos.”

The exact nature of the group's cause was unclear although Radio Free Asia
reported it related to complaints against by local government officials.

Petitioning is an ancient tradition in China. Millions of citizens
continue to flock to the capital each year to air their grievances even
though few cases are ever solved.

Earlier this year Beijing promised to reform the petitioning system and
protect petitioners who are often beaten or illegally imprisoned to stop
them taking their complaints to the capital.

However, Maya Wang, a Hong Kong-based researcher from Human Rights Watch,
said there was no evidence to suggest that such violations were
diminishing.

“We haven’t heard of any noticeable improvement in the way authorities
handle petitions,” Ms Wang said.

The attempted suicides were likely driven by “the sense of desperation
among petitioners” who had spent years unsuccessfully trying to alert
authorities to their problems, Ms Wang added.