Protests are breaking out across China, including at universities and in Shanghai, where hundreds of people chanted “Go away, Xi Jinping! Resign, Communist Party!” in an unprecedented show of defiance against the strict and increasingly expensive of the zero-Covid country, reports CNN.
The protests intensified after a deadly fire at an apartment building in the country’s western Xinjiang region left 10 people dead and nine others injured on Thursday. Anger grew after a video emerged that appeared to suggest the containment measures delayed firefighters reaching victims.
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Protests erupted in cities and universities across China on Saturday and early Sunday morning, according to videos shared on social media and witness accounts.
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Videos widely shared on Chinese social media showed hundreds of people in central Shanghai lighting candles Saturday to mourn the dead in the Xinjiang fire.
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The crowd later held up blank sheets of white paper – in what is traditionally a symbolic protest against censorship – and chanted: “We need human rights, we need freedom.”
In several videos seen by CNN, people could be heard shouting for Chinese leader Xi Jinping to “resign.” The crowd also chanted “I don’t want a Covid test, I want freedom!” and “I don’t want dictatorship, I want democracy!”
Some videos show people singing China’s national anthem and The Internationale, a standard of the socialist movement, while holding signs protesting Beijing’s exceptionally strict measures against the pandemic.
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Protests also broke out in the capital Beijing. A student at the prestigious Peking University told CNN that when he arrived at the protest site around 1 a.m. local time, there were about 100 students and security guards were trying to cover up a protest slogan painted on wall.
“Say no to blockade, yes to freedom. No to the Covid test, yes to the food,” he wrote in red paint on the wall, echoing the slogan of a protest that took place on a Beijing passageway in October, just days before a key Communist Party meeting at which Xi assured a third term in power.
“Open your eyes and look at the world, the zero-Covid policy is a lie,” read the protest slogan at Peking University.
The student said security guards later covered the slogan with black paint.
The students were later dispersed by teachers and security guards.
In the eastern province of Jiangsu, dozens of students from the Communication University of China, Nanjing gathered to mourn those who died in the Xinjiang fire. The videos show young people holding up sheets of white paper and cellphones flashing. In one video, a university official warned students: “You will pay for what you did today.”
“And you, and so is the country,” answered a student.
Publisher: GM
Tags: Jinping Students protest China unprecedented demonstrations spread due Covid lockdowns
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