Some 150 Chinese seeking action from their government on various grievances protested outside a UN office in Beijing yesterday while UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan visited China.
About 100 uniformed and plainclothes police kept the demonstrators away from the gates of the office building, which houses the UN High Commission for Refugees and other diplomatic offices. Police prevented the protesters from marching to the main UN compound two blocks away and with cajoling and mild force put most of the protesters on to a bus, ending the protest.
The protesters, many poorly dressed, are among thousands of Chinese who swarm into Beijing daily seeking help in resolving longstanding grievances with officials back home. Usually ignored, they have increasingly turned up outside UN offices and the US ambassador's residence, hoping international intervention will succeed where their government has failed.
"We come from all over China. But we have all been treated unjustly," said one protester, He Fangwu, who claimed his family in Yunshan, Hunan Province, had been subjected to fines, beatings and confiscation of property in a dispute over family planning policies.
In a sample of their disparate causes, one woman from southern Guizhou said police failed to investigate after she was beaten and abducted by a gang who sold her to a farmer as a bride. Another from southwestern Chongqing said she was poorly compensated when local authorities demolished her home.
Most of the protesters were unaware that Annan was in China. The secretary-general did not know about the protest, UN officials said. Annan, who arrived in Beijing on Friday, was traveling in the countryside yesterday.
Contacted by telephone, police at headquarters and at the district office where the protest occurred said they either did not know or refused to comment on the demonstration and if there were arrests.
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