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Homeowners beaten on the front page

JDM070528tbns2.jpg
The Beijing News 28 May, 2007.

The top headline in The Beijing News today announces that Wen Jiabao took an inspection tour of pig farms to address the rising price of pork, but the front page image shows something much less harmonious: homeowners being beaten by a gang of men armed with pipes.

On 24 May, property owners at a community in Beishatan, Chaoyang District, met to protest the construction of unplanned buildings on their community's green space. They were met by more than one hundred men armed with poles and shovels who sent eight of them to the hospital.

The photographs were circulated at an information meeting held last night to update the homeowners on the latest developments in the case: the police had arrested three people, including a representative of the security company. One suspect is still at large. TBN published five of thirty-nine photos, but the others will probably appear online before long.

In other newspapers, Beijing Times leads with the Wen Jiabao pork story and features a photo of ping-pong winners. The top headline in the Beijing Daily Messenger reveals that public transportation will soon carry route and traffic information inside buses and subway cars, and the top photo is of a football scuffle. Beijing Youth Daily features a photo of a shop given rent-free to Ai Dongmei. The top headline announces new, relaxed punishments for unlicensed street vendors: only a warning, and no fine, will be given for a first offense. All papers put this item somewhere on their front page.

See below for more beating photos from TBN.

JDM070528tbn1.jpg
Men carrying weapons attack homeowners (man in white at center; crouching woman at lower left; woman holding pipe at lower right).
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Men armed with steel pipes and shovels attack homeowners. One homeowner has collapsed on the ground.
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Six hours before the beatings, a representative of the property managers is restrained by another individual. The representative, Tong Lijun, later claimed that he was not at the scene during the fighting. Police later found he was at the scene but determined that he did not participate.
JDM070528tbn4.jpg
Hou Liping, 44, had her forehead fractured. Police officers contributed 17,000 yuan for her emergency room fees and her condition is no longer critical.
JDM070528tbn5.jpg
A homeowner sits on the ground after being beaten.
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There are currently 6 Comments for Homeowners beaten on the front page.

Comments on Homeowners beaten on the front page

It happens a lot in China.

And it's very disturbing...

It goes to show there are still lots of fuc*ed up things in China...Still have long ways to go to become a "harmonious society." What a bunch of b.s. Chalk another one up to low "su zhi".

Crap like this just makes me sick... Worried about the future of man kind etc...

Chinese people are very fucked up in many ways. I guess part of it is due to years of isolation? Many people with low morality? Don't care? Uneducated fools? What can we do to enlighten more people?

Wow, was it like this in New York when it was on its rise? Makes me want to invest in real estate.

A civil city, Beijing will be host to next year's Olympics, which will be all about the love of friendly competition between countries! Foreigners need not worry about their safety, as the locals will be too busy beating each other with steel pipes to harass visitors.

The most telling part of the pictures are the part that no-one comments on --- the huge crowd of gawpers in the background.

Did they enjoy the show, one wonders?

Fucking cowards.

I wouldn't rely too much on the old “su zhi“ line. Besides being rather condescending to say the least, these things are much deeper than that: the government lacks the confidence to hold capital accountable and, as a result, businesspeople--perhaps more even than local officials--seem to feel they are kings.

There isn't anybody who has commented on the ads posted by Google below the title of the article and at the end of the article. "Survive any attack" and "Stun munitions"...

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