China boosts security after protests against virus curbs
There was no sign of new demonstrations on Monday in Beijing or Shanghai, but dozens of police were in the areas where the weekend protests took place; UN calls on China to respect right to peaceful protests
Police on Monday patrolled the scenes of weekend protests in Shanghai and Beijing ater crowds there and in other cities across China demonstrated against stringent COVID-19 measures disrupting lives three years into the pandemic.
Meanwhile, UN called on China to respect right to peaceful protests.
“We call on the authorities to respond to protests in line with international human rights laws and standards. No one should be arbitrarily detained for peacefully expressing their opinions,” UN Human Rights Office spokesman Jeremy Laurence told reporters.
From the streets of several Chinese cities to dozens of university campuses, protesters made a show of civil disobedience unprecedented since leader Xi Jinping assumed power a decade ago. “What we object to is these restrictions on people’s rights in the name of virus prevention, and the restrictions on individual freedom and people’s livelihoods,” said Jason Sun, a college student in Shanghai.
There was no sign of new protests on Monday in Beijing or Shanghai, but dozens of police were in the areas where the weekend demonstrations took place. Asked about widespread anger over China’s ZERO-COVID policy, foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian told reporters, “What you mentioned does not reflect what actually happened. We believe that with the leadership of the Communist Party of China, and co-operation and support of the Chinese people, our fight against COVID-19 will be successful.”
The backlash against COVID-19 curbs is a setback for China’s efforts to eradicate the virus, which is infecting record numbers three years ater it emerged in the central city of Wuhan.
The ZERO-COVID policy has kept China’s official death toll in the thousands, against more than a million in the United States, but has come at the cost of confining many millions to long spells at home, bringing extensive disruption and damage to the world’s second-largest economy.
Abandoning it would mean rolling back a policy championed by Xi. It would also risk overwhelming the health system and lead to widespread illness and deaths in a country with hundreds of millions of elderly and low levels of immunity to COVID-19, experts say. The protests roiled global markets on Monday, sending oil prices lower and the dollar higher, with Chinese stocks and the yuan falling sharply.
State media did not mention the protests, instead urging citizens in editorials to stick to COVID-19 rules. Many analysts say China is unlikely to re-open before March or April, and needs an effective vaccination campaign before that.
“The demonstrations do not imminently threaten the existing political order, but they do mean the current COVID-19 policy mix is no longer politically sustainable,” analysts at Gavekal Dragonomics wrote in a note.
“The question now is what re-opening will look like. The answer is: slow, incremental and messy.”
Late on Sunday, protesters clashed with police in the commercial hub of Shanghai, where its 25 million people were stuck at home in April and May, with security forces taking away a busload of people.
On Monday, the Shanghai streets where protesters gathered were blocked with blue metal barriers to prevent crowds gathering. Police in high-visibility vests patrolled in pairs, while police cars and motorbikes cruised by.
Shops and cafes in the area were asked to close, a staff member at one told reporters.
While China’s COVID-19 policy has remained a major source of uncertainty for investors, they are now also being watched for any sign of political instability, something many of them had not considered in authoritarian China, where Xi recently secured a third leadership term.
Martin Petch, vice president at Moody’s Investors Service, said the ratings agency expected the protests “to dissipate relatively quickly and without resulting in serious political violence.”
“However, they have the potential to be credit negative if they are sustained and produce a more forceful response by the authorities.”
The catalyst for the protests was an apartment fire last week in the western city of Urumqi that killed 10 people. Many speculated that COVID-19 curbs in the city, parts of which had been under lockdown for 100 days, had hindered rescue and escape, which city officials denied.