"Chinese police block parents at quake protest; As public anger brews, authorities hardening stance" by Cara Anna, Associated Press | June 4, 2008
DUJIANGYAN, China - Angry parents whose children were killed in an earthquake-stricken school shouted "Oh, my child!" and "Tell us something!" when police forcefully removed them yesterday from a protest outside a courthouse.
The police action was the clearest signal yet that authorities are hardening their stance against the impromptu displays of public anger over the May 12 earthquake that collapsed schools and killed thousands of children.
The students' deaths have become the focus for Chinese, both inside and outside the quake zone, fueling accusations about corruption in school construction. The brewing public anger has become a political challenge and threatens to turn popular sentiment against the authoritarian government as it copes with aiding millions displaced by the disaster.
Aggrieved parents and even rescuers have pointed to steel rods in broken concrete slabs that were thinner than a ball point pen among the 7,000 classrooms that were destroyed.
"Oh, my child!" one woman wailed as officers took the arms of the parents gathered outside the courthouse in this resort town. "Tell us something!" other parents shouted as they were led away. Their children had died in the Juyuan Middle School.
Journalists were then dragged up the courthouse steps by police - "For your safety!" they shouted. The journalists included an Associated Press reporter and two photographers who were held inside and questioned for a half-hour before being let go, after the protesters had been moved away.
Which is why this is "news," isn't it, readers?
The parents were forced along the sidewalk and out of sight. Surrounded by police at a side entrance to the courthouse, they tried to present what some described as a lawsuit, saying they had no other option because local officials weren't responding.
The papers were refused, the parents said. Calls to local police were not answered.
"This wasn't a riot!" Zao Ming, an official from the foreign affairs office of the local government, said after the protest. "These people were just disrupting society. . . . The government will solve their problems."
No thanks!!! They are the ones who CREATE PROBLEMS!!!!
The government has taken some steps to try to help grieving parents. Yesterday, Beijing began giving compensation to some families whose children were killed - about $144 per year to each parent who lost an only child. The Ministry of Civil Affairs also announced that parents who had lost their only child had first priority in adopting children orphaned by the disaster.
That's it? That's all a Chinese child's life is worth? $144 dollars a year?
Not here. Chinese lives are PRICELESS on this blog!!!!
Meanwhile, the death toll from the quake rose yesterday to 69,107 and relief efforts continued in the sprawling disaster zone. Thousands of soldiers searched for a military helicopter that crashed Saturday near the epicenter, with 14 injured quake victims and a crew of five aboard.
Authorities also monitored the climbing water levels in a huge lake formed when a quake-triggered landslide blocked a river, the state-run Xinhua News Agency reported.
Suspicions between the government and grieving parents have grown since the quake. Plainclothes police roamed the grounds of the collapsed Xinjian - or New Construction - Elementary School in Dujiangyan during a memorial for International Children's Day on June 1, a parent said.
They whispered into parents' ears, "Be careful what you say among the foreign media," said Yang, a father at the event who only gave his surname.
Good thing that doesn't happen in the U.S., huh? Pffffftttt!!!
At least our citizens and media SELF-CENSOR!!!!
Parents at the school said they scuffled with police yesterday, after the authorities tried to block reporters from doing interviews. "The police twisted the hands of some of the parents. It's too much!" said Chen Bijun, who lost her 12-year-old son in the collapse.
Parents arriving at the site yesterday found that authorities had removed their symbols of mourning and protest, replacing them with a single banner that said "Mourn the students who met grief." The parents immediately tore it down.
Now, removing the memorials, that was just not right!!!!
Both incidents happened while Chinese leader Li Changchun, the country's fifth-ranked official, was touring other parts of the city, visiting survivors and relief workers, Xinhua said.
China's government had been generally praised for its response to the earthquake, including the freedoms allowed both to foreign and domestic media.
Certainly not the tone we got starting off the article, huh, readers?
Too bad the same can't be said for the AmeriKan MSM, huh?
The Juyuan Middle School was sealed off with police tape yesterday. "People can't come in, for their safety," a policeman at the site said."
Meanwhile, the Washington Post -- the CIA's favorite newspaper -- continues with the beat-down of a prostrate China.
BEIJING - Chinese judicial authorities have in effect disbarred two activist lawyers who offered to defend Tibetans arrested in a recent Chinese security crackdown, lawyers said yesterday.
The two, Jiang Tianyong and Teng Biao, were denied renewal of the annual licenses necessary to practice law in China because of what Beijing Judicial Bureau officials described as a willingness to take on "sensitive" cases such as those involving charges of human rights abuses by the government, Jiang said.
The decision was consistent with a broad security tightening in recent months in the lead up to the Beijing Olympics in August. Authorities have shown particular sensitivity about Tibet, which is still closed off to foreign tourists and reporters, and Xinjiang, where the Public Security Bureau has accused Muslim separatists of plotting terrorist attacks to disrupt the games.
Yeah, but those "terrorist" warnings must be an excuse.
That is, unless they are directed at America!
Jiang and Teng were among 18 Chinese lawyers with a record of human rights activism who signed an open letter offering legal help to Tibetans arrested after riots erupted March 14 in Lhasa, the Tibetan capital, and quickly spread to other areas of the country where Tibetans live.
Responding to the riots, Chinese security forces arrested a large number of Tibetans on charges of arson, inciting subversion of state authority, and other charges. Scores have been jailed and many more forced to undergo what are called patriotic education courses, designed to promote loyalty to the Chinese government and discourage Tibetan nationalism.
Sort of like the American public education system, isn't it?
Human Rights in China, the US-based advocacy group, denounced the bureau's decision against the two lawyers as an attempt by the Chinese government to discourage lawyers from representing people who have human rights complaints. China cannot claim to enjoy rule of law unless lawyers are allowed to defend those accused of crimes, the group said.
And HOW ABOUT the U.S., HRW?!
You know, SECRET PRISONS, SECRET TORTURE and INDEFINITE DETENTIONS!!!
"The targeting of lawyers who take cases deemed sensitive by the authorities makes a mockery of rule of law and newly effective amendments to the Lawyers Law, which claims to protect the practice of law by lawyers," Sharon Hom, executive director of Human Rights in China, said. "The politicized use of the annual registration system undercuts a critical component of any rule of law: independent and professional lawyers doing their jobs."
Li Xiongbing, a lawyer along with Jiang at the Gaobo Longhua law firm in Beijing, said almost all those who signed the letter offering help to Tibetans had trouble getting their licenses renewed before the June 1 deadline. Five had lost their licenses because of previous run-ins with judicial authorities, he said.
Sort of like the 8 prosecutors fired for political reasons by the Bush White House, right?
I am TIRED of the American exceptionalism and hypocrisy, folks -- particularly when it is brought to us by a Zionist-controlled, propagandistic War Daily!
Jiang said authorities also told his law firm to "strengthen internal management." That, Jiang said, meant that the firm should steer lawyers from such human rights cases."
Like I said, China isn't a great bunch of guys, but then, no government is!
