(Beijing) Hundreds of people took to the streets on Sunday in Beijing, Shanghai and other cities across China to protest over-the-top lockdowns, a rare show of hostility to President Xi Jinping’s regime and its policy of ” zero COVID-19” draconian practiced for almost three years.
Unexpected, massive and endless confinements to the discovery of the slightest case, systematic quarantine of contact cases in camps and negative PCR tests required almost daily to have access to public space are increasingly exasperating the Chinese population. Discontent stoked by several high-profile cases in which the emergency services, during accidents, would have been slowed down by health restrictions, with fatal consequences.
A fire that killed ten people Thursday in Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang province (west), exacerbated these recriminations. Numerous posts circulating on social media have blamed anti-COVID-19 measures for having aggravated this tragedy, with cars parked for weeks due to confinement in the narrow alley leading to the burning building having hampered the help arrives.
On Sunday afternoon, hundreds of people demonstrated in silence in the center of Shanghai, a metropolis of 25 million inhabitants subjected at the beginning of the year to an exhausting two-month confinement.
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Police block a street in Shanghai.
Brandishing white flowers and sheets of white paper – which have become a symbol of protest against censorship – the protesters posted themselves silently at several intersections before being dispersed by the police, according to witnesses.
“Xi Jinping resignation! »
Another protest had already taken place the previous night not far from there. A video widely circulated on the internet and geotagged by AFP showed people shouting “Xi Jinping, resign!” and also attacking the Chinese Communist Party, a very rare demonstration of hostility towards the president and the regime in the economic capital of the country.
This first protest took place at dawn on Sunday on Wulumuqi Street – the Mandarin name for the city of Urumqi. “There were a few minor scuffles, but overall the policing was civilized,” said a witness. “It’s crazy to know that in these circumstances, there are still so many brave people who stand out,” he exclaimed.
Several witnesses reported that at least two people were taken away by the security forces. Asked by AFP, the local police did not react.
Between 200 and 300 students from the prestigious Tsinghua University in Beijing also protested on their campus on Sunday, according to a witness and images posted on social media.
This witness reported that around 11:30 a.m. (10:30 p.m.), a female student began by holding up a sheet of white paper and was joined by other women.
PHOTO PROVIDED, VIA REUTERS
Between 200 and 300 students from the prestigious Tsinghua University in Beijing also demonstrated on their campus on Sunday.
“We sang the national anthem and the International, and chanted: “freedom will triumph”, “no PCR tests, we want food”, “no to confinements, we want freedom”, “said again. this witness.
“Not a normal life!” »
Internet videos showed a crowd in front of the university canteen, gathered around a speaker who shouted: “This is not a normal life, we have had enough. Our lives weren’t like this before! »
Another video apparently taken from the same location showed students shouting “democracy and rule of law, freedom of speech”, but it was quickly removed from the internet.
A vigil in memory of the victims of the Urumqi fire also took place on the night of Saturday to Sunday at Peking University, neighboring Tsinghua University. According to a student who participated, the protesters began to gather on Saturday evening around midnight on campus, and the crowd reached between 100 and 200 people.
“I heard people shouting: ‘no to COVID-19 tests, yes to freedom'”, he said, showing AFP photos and videos corroborating his statements.
Videos on social networks also showed a major vigil at the Institute of Communications in Nanjing (east), as well as small gatherings in Xian, Wuhan (center) and Guangzhou (south), but the authenticity of these images could not be verified by AFP.
Hashtags relating to the protests were censored on the Weibo platform, and sensitive videos were deleted from the Duoyin and Kuaishou sharing sites.
Sporadic and sometimes violent protests have already taken place across the country in recent days, including at the world’s largest iPhone factory in central Zhengzhou, as well as in Urumqi after the fire.
China recorded 39,506 cases of COVID-19 on Sunday, a daily record that remains very low compared to figures recorded elsewhere in the world at the height of the pandemic.