Chinese villagers attack factory after reports of polluting
Source: Guardian
The Chinese public are becoming increasingly critical of the fouling of the country’s air, soil and waterways by decades of development.
Villagers in south-western China, infuriated by a factory that was polluting the environment, smashed its offices and equipment and later clashed with police.
Residents of Baha, a village in Yunnan province, said they had grown increasingly angry over a local metalwork factory that had been coughing up black smoke and discharging polluted wastewater into the rural area. After the factory's boss refused to meet with villagers last week, they smashed cars, equipment, offices and dormitories.
Environmental protests are on the rise in China, with the public becoming increasingly critical of the fouling of the country's air, soil and waterways during decades of breakneck development. The unrest poses a serious political challenge to the Communist party – anger over the party's response, or lack thereof, to environmental crises has fuelled wider dissatisfaction with corruption and a lack of official accountability.
Most protests have taken place along China's developed coastal region, reflecting the area's heavy pollution from industry as well as the rising demands of the country's well-off. But the latest unrest was in rural Yunnan, indicating the protest has now spread further inland.
Read more: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/12/chinese-villagers-factory-polluting-police-baha-attack
"Environmental protests are on the rise in China" as well they should be. Protests are spreading from urban areas to rural ones.
Wonder what these folks would think of the Elk River chemical spill in West Virginia. I hope our own environmental problems can be addressed without citizen attacks on company offices.
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Last edited Wed Feb 12, 2014, 07:16 PM - Edit history (2)
The rural backwater of China Proper, that area right next to Tibet and Xinjiang (Shinjang) and south of Inner Mongolia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China_proper
Unlike the coastal areas, these areas have NOT had the massive expansion, in fact has seen reduction in wealth over the last 40 years. This is the area that supported the Communists, in South China before the "Long March" and in North China after the "Long March" of 1933-35 and was the are that the Communist Army march through with the support of the people of those areas.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_March
In the South this is also the area of the mid 1800s rebellion of Taiping rebellion of 1850-1867:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiping_Rebellion
While the Taiping Rebellion did reach Nanking and Shanghai, they failed to take Shanghai, through they did take and hold Nanking till 1863.
The Nien Rebellion occurred at the same time, but this time in Rural Northern China:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nien_Rebellion
Moslems living next to Burma also revolted in that time period, trying to set up a independent Moslem Chinese Government:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Du_Wenxiu_Rebellion
Another Moslem revolt occurred next to Inner Mongolia, again in the rural West of China Proper:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_rebellions_in_China#Taiping_Rebellion
The uprising in 1911 that actually did in the Empire of China and replaced it with the Republic of China also occurred in the West, in the province next to Tibet:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wuchang_Uprising
Thus Rural West China is where revolts that overthrow Governments begin, also massive revolts that come close to overthrowing Governments. It is when these people demand reform and start to support reformers that you have the start of rebellions that when they fail, still force China to do reforms that benefit these rural areas, or if they succeed, help these rural areas.
This is also the area of China the Republic of China Retreated to during the 1930s as Japan took over the coast. Once Japan left, this area STOPPED supporting the Republic of China and started to support the Communists, who then used that support to take over the rest of the Country.
The Mongols under Genghis Khan could NOT conquer China as they tried to march South from what is now Beijing. Instead, the Mongols attacked Western China, took over those areas, and then marched down the rivers to the coast taking over all of China.
When the Ming Dynasty fell, it was to a peasant revolt out of West Rural China:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Li_Zicheng
That rebellion was later put down by the Manchus, who proceeded to take over all of China, but the rural West was last. The Manchus could NOT have taken over China without the rural revolt in Western China and its attack on the capital of Ming China.'
I bring this up, for when it comes to political instability in China, it starts in Western Rural China and spreads to the rest of the country. It spreads by going down stream. It is hard to put down once such a revolt takes place, for as it retreats up stream, any attacking army has to deal with hostile peasant population and no roads, while the rural rebels can go from river valley to river valley, over the mountains, knowing they can get new supplies from those same peasants once in the new valley. The Japanese found this out during WWII, they could take the coast of China but did not have the men or supplies to move to far from the coast except for brief campaigns that ended up meaning nothing.
Thus a revolt in Rural Western China Proper (NOT Tibet or Xinjiang) is the biggest fear of any Ruling government of China.
