Inside China Today

Police violence in Harbin leaves one university student dead

A violent altercation between six policemen and university students at Harbin city in Heilongjaing province last Saturday (October 11) night has left a 22 year old student dead, and the Harbin city Politi-bureau committee holding an emergency meeting on Monday to prevent large scale riots in the city.
The deceased has been identified as 22 year old Ling Sonling, a former student at the Harbin Institute of Physical Education. On Saturday night Lin and 4 others went to a pub next to the Harbin Rail cultural Museum to celebrate a friend’s birthday and the group entered into an argument over car park spaces with police who had just left the pub. Lin was dragged by 6 policemen about 80 metres away from the pub and brutally beaten, and the 192cm tall student died at the scene.

It is reported that the deceased had wounds on many parts of the body, but there was minimal bleeding. It is believed he died of internal injuries from the brusies all over his body. 4 of his friends who were also injured during the violent altercation recall that the attacking police boasted a few times that “it wouldn’t matter to beat a few of them to death”.

Harbin City Politi-bureau Committee has convened an emergency meeting on Monday to prevent large scale riots breaking out in the city over the killing.

The police violence comes as Beijing resident Yang Jia’s appeal opened in Shanghai. Yang Jia has been hailed by many Chinese as a modern day hero for his killing of 6 Shanghai police after he was allegedly assaulted by police at the Shanghais’ Zhabei Police Station resulting in injuries to his genitals, which has left him infertile.

Current affairs commentator Li Hongkuan believes that Yang’s killing of Shanghai police and the latest incident of Harbin police killing a university student is clearly showing that the tension between China’s officials and the public is now out of control. He says that there are now more cases of members of the public dying from police violence indicating the abuse of power by communist officials has reached an all time high; and that although Chinese Communist Party leader Hu Jingtao is calling for a harmonious society and putting the people first, his dictatorship machine is instead carrying out a policy of death by beating.

Li Hongkuan says that the problem of police violence in China stems from the ambiguous role of China’s police, and that since the hijacking of the rulership over China by the CCP, the relationship between police and the public has been turned upside down, with the Chinese people now supporting the livelihood of the police force.

Li points out that there are two possible results of this tension, one is that the number of members of the public being beaten to death by police will increase, and the other is that, if the people do not die in silence, they will erupt from the silence.

The above news is brought to you by special reporter Qing Yue and hosted by ChrisThomas for Inside China Today on the SOH Radio Network.