WP,p1:Chinese Riot Rooted in Confusion(protests major concern for Beijing)

[DeepModem Mom]

A Chinese Riot Rooted in Confusion
Lacking a Channel for Grievances, Garment Workers Opt to Strike

By Edward Cody
Washington Post Foreign Service
Monday, July 18, 2005; Page A01


XIZHOU, China -- A lean worker in a red T-shirt squatted beside the battered police motorcycle and, reaching out with his cigarette lighter, ignited a trickle of leaking gasoline. Flames immediately whooshed to life, witnesses recalled, and black smoke licked up in an oily cloud, signaling that a chaotic strike at Futai Textile Factory had turned into a riot.

Before the day was over, several hundred anti-riot police had fired tear gas and swung truncheons against a mob of 3,000 enraged workers, who, witnesses said, had pelted cars and buses with rocks, bricks and watermelon rinds. Chanting demands for higher pay, the workers fought back as best they could, but ultimately most fled. A few of the injured ended up in the hospital, friends and relatives said, and about 20 were locked into jail cells.

The riot, on the morning of June 3, had its roots in the refusal of China's government to permit the establishment of any independent organization, including nongovernment labor unions, as a reliable, independent channel for workers' grievances. It was a shocking first for Xizhou, a raw industrial zone on the northeastern edge of the city of Guangzhou, in southern China's muggy Pearl River Delta. But across China there are thousands of such explosions every year -- by farmers who lose their land, workers who get laid off and villagers who feel cheated by corrupt officials.

The protests have become a major concern for the Communist Party government in Beijing at a time of meteoric economic growth and massive migration from villages to factories, raising the prospect of broad instability that could potentially undermine the party's grip on power. In apparent recognition of the danger, President Hu Jintao and his lieutenants have made appeals for "a harmonious society" and "social stability" a refrain in their public appearances....


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/07/17/AR2005071700931.html

[David__77]

1. Excellent.

This is simply the working class attempting to fulfill the role the Chinese state pretends that they are supposed to have--being masters of society. Perhaps Hu Jintao should be more concerned with working people and less with foreign capitalists.

[HereSince1628]

2. Not advocating violence, but independent workers unions

are the only way that the "global market" will be forced to raise the pay and living standards of workers everywhere

[dArKeR]

3. This is the first time I remember Edward Cody writing a story on

China and/or Taiwan. Does anyone know about this guy?

Cause I know Philip Pan is really a dirty guy. He's the one who usually writes the CN/TW stories. He's so completely bias I can tell by his writings he's a Mailand KMT Chinese. I'm sure of it. I know his parents are of that origin. It's like hiring Hilter's son to write about Germany during WWII.

So I was wondering if anyone knows Cody's background?

Thanks.

[Coexist]

4. this is the price for our $8 Wal-Mart sweaters

low prices take their human toll.

[54anickel]

5. Bloody China riot caught on film (Same riot?)

Wait, no the original article is about one on June 3.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4097950.stm

Dramatic footage has emerged of a riot in a Chinese village at the weekend in which six people are reported to have been killed.
The pictures show local farmers fighting a pitched battle with dozens of unknown men wearing camouflage gear and construction helmets.

Hunting rifles and clubs were used in the bloody clashes in the northern village of Shenyou.

It was filmed by a resident and then given to the Washington Post newspaper.

Chinese state media said that the residents had been resisting the takeover of their property by an electricity company which wants to build a power plant there.

more...

[54anickel]

10. More here (the WP article is the only thing I can find that is trying to

make a tie between labor unions and riots in China). Something doesn't jive.

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2005/jul2005/chin-j15.shtml

snip>

Recently, in another confrontation between farmers and Chinese authorities in Shengyou in Hebei province, six farmers were killed and up to 100 others seriously injured. The protest, reported in “Peasant unrest continues in China”, was triggered by a dispute over land expropriated by the local government for a state-owned Guohua Dingzhou power plant.

A villager Niu Zhanzong managed to film the attack before he was knocked down, his camera smashed and his arm broken. “We hope the central government will come and investigate. We believe in the central party, but we don’t believe in the local police,” he said.

The film, however, was posted on the Washington Post website, provoking a nervous response from Beijing, which duly sacked the local Communist Party boss and local mayor. A construction contractor and 21 accomplices have been arrested for the killings.

Since then, the Hong Kong-based newspaper Apple Daily has indicated that the incident may involve the highest levels of Chinese bureaucracy. The man behind the efforts to drive the farmers off their land may well be none other than the son of Li Peng, the former Chinese Premier, who was directly responsible in 1989 for ordering troops to carry out the Tiananmen Square massacre.

Li’s family is notorious for corrupt profiteering in China’s power industry, effectively running some major state-owned plants as their private businesses. Li’s son, Li Xiaopeng, is the manager of the power station believed to behind the expulsion of the farmers.

[Anarcho-Socialist]

6. China uneasy as labor unrest grows

XIZHOU, China, July 18 (UPI) -- The government of China is facing a growing number of violent labor protests as a result of the country's economic boom.

With the economic boom, a massive migration has begun from villages to cities, where jobs are available in industry. However, in the city of Guangzhou in southern China, politicians are closely monitoring the Futai Textile Factory, where worker dissent turned violent in early June.

Nearly 3,000 workers stepped away from their weaving looms and ended battling with police.

The Washington Post said the action began when workers received their monthly pay checks and saw their wages had been reduced. The men work 11 hours per day, with one day off per month.

Wu Huiquan, whose Hong Kong-based Fu Xin group owns the factory, said workers at the factory, one of 10 run by Fu Xin in a $100 million-a-year business, earn an average of $85 to $105 a month, with some of the more experienced making considerably more.

Source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/upi/index.php?feed=TopNews&article=UPI-1-20050718-08115300-bc-china-protests.xml

[lvx35]

7. Good!

It must be infuriating to live in one of the most exploitative capitalist regimes and have to still have all the BS of living in communist country.

[Anarcho-Socialist]

8. Yes, it's the worst of both worlds n/t

[htuttle]

9. Sounds like the "Worker's Paradise" could use some labor unions!

So who wants to grab a stack of AFL-CIO signup cards and parachute in there?

You want one good way to help the US economy? Unionize China.