Chinese police fight three-day battle over factory

Workers protesting the sale of a factory in south-western China clashed for three days with baton-wielding police, a factory employee and a news website said today, underscoring the country’s growing social tensions.

The conflict at the No. 354 military factory in the south-western city of Chengdu left some of the workers injured – one of them in critical condition, according to the site.

It was the latest in series of violent clashes between authorities and citizens angry over corruption, the widening gap between rich and poor and official attempts to seize land for allegedly inadequate compensation.

The Chengdu incident occurred January 16 and lasted for three days, an employee reached by telephone said yesterday. She refused to give her name.

She said the factory was on the verge of bankruptcy and was going to be sold, but workers opposed the move. They had confined the manager to the factory and restricted his movement, she said.

On January 16, about 1,300 military police came to the factory to rescue the manager and a bloody struggle broke out, the employee said.

Military police were prevented from entering the factory by thousands of workers and responded by beating them with clubs and electric batons, Boxun said.

The woman said she could not confirm what weapons the police used but said “there were definitely some injuries.” She could not give specific numbers.

The four hospitals in the area refused to say if anyone from the protest had been admitted.

Telephones at local government offices were not answered today.

At least one person was in a critical condition, Boxun said.

According to figures released by the government last week, the number of cases of public disorder in China jumped to 87,000 last year, highlighting the country’s continuing battle to curb social instability.

Disputes involving land seizures, pollution and other issues are a key concern for communist leaders, who worry about spreading unrest among hundreds of millions of rural and urban Chinese, many of whom have been left behind by the country’s 25-year economic boom.

Earlier this month, a clash between farmers and police over allegedly inadequate compensation for seized farmland in the southern province of Guangdong reportedly left dozens injured and a teenage girl dead.

In December, authorities opened fire into a crowd of protesting villagers in another village in Guangdong, a densely populated province of more than 100 million people where farmers and factories compete for scarce land.

The government said three people were killed in Dongzhou, while villagers put the death toll at up to 20.