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Sanity -> Forced Abortions (5/24/2007 1:49:31 PM)
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Chinese villagers denounce brutal 'one-child' blitz
Residents of this southern China county on Thursday angrily accused authorities of forcing women to have abortions and vandalising homes in a brutal campaign to enforce birth-control policies.
"Many women have been forced to have abortions. Authorities are going into their homes and destroying their homes to implement the policy," said a woman in Bobai county who gave only her surname, Chen. "The people are angry. This is not the way to carry it out."
Bobai was at the heart of riots that erupted late last week across Guangxi region and saw thousands of people take to the streets in anger against local authorities' efforts to enforce China's so-called "one-child policy".
Chen was one of dozens of people in the county to corroborate reports that government "work teams" had raided homes, carried out mass arrests and levied crippling fines across Guangxi, a sprawling region near the Vietnam border.
Authorities had even forced women pregnant with their first child to undergo abortions merely because they had not completed paperwork required before getting pregnant, said a woman surnamed Xu, a waitress in a Bobai restaurant that was deserted at lunchtime due to fear pervading the district.
"This has been going on for about three months. The one-child policy is wrong. We are totally against it. I know a woman who committed suicide by jumping in the river because she did not want to be caught by the work teams," Xu said.
A feeling of palpable tension has gripped the area, where deserted roads contrast with bright red-and-white banners and billboards bearing government slogans such as: "Support the one-child policy" and "Happiness is to have one child".
"Everyone is afraid to come out," Xu said. The mood was even more intense Thursday at Wang Mao, a nearby village where about 50 angry residents surrounded foreign journalists to loudly accuse work teams of beating residents and imposing exorbitant fines on violators.
"Our children were sitting on the table and they barged in and turned the table over and were screaming and shouting at us," an elderly woman said over the din of angry voices.
One woman, apparently aged in her 20s and holding a one-year-old child, said she was fined 30,000 yuan (3,900 dollars) for having a second child after failing to complete paperwork that would have allowed the birth.
"This is not about population control. It's about money. They just want money," one man standing alongside the woman shouted.
Several villagers said residents of the area fought back, driving off work teams.
"The work teams don't dare come out now," the man said.
First introduced in the late 1970s amid fears of runaway population growth, China's controversial family planning policies limit urban residents to one child while allowing rural families two children if their first child is a girl.
The official Xinhua news agency said on Wednesday that 28 people in Guangxi had been arrested for rioting after seven towns erupted in violence. About 3,000 people had protested, ransacking government offices and destroying official vehicles, according to the official version.
But a man surnamed Wang in Bobai town said the numbers were far higher, backing up other residents' assertions that tens of thousands of people had protested.
"Don't believe the government. Many, many more people than that have been arrested. This is happening everywhere," he said. "The one-child policy is correct. China has too many people. But the way they are carrying it out is wrong. It is not right to smash up people's homes and fine them."
"Everyone here is against the government."
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=070524142748.92j8j1db&show_article=1
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