Protester breaks silence on China's crackdown on COVID demonstrators
Send a link to a friend
[April 19, 2023]
By Oliver Denzer and Laurie Chen
HAMBURG/BEIJING (Reuters) -Dazed and terrified, Yicheng Huang narrowly
managed to escape being detained by police in Shanghai while attending
historic protests calling for an end to China's COVID-19 curbs that
spread across numerous cities last November.
The protests, unprecedented in President Xi Jinping's decade in power,
were suppressed by police within days but helped hasten the end of three
years of restrictions, sources have previously told Reuters.
Four months later, 26-year-old Huang fled to Germany and decided to
speak out in support of fellow demonstrators, some of whom remain in
detention.
He is one of the first to publicly reveal his identity, after the vast
majority of protesters fell silent under threat of official retribution.
"The moment I was detained was the most terrifying minute of my life.
But after having experienced that, I now feel like I won't be afraid
again," Huang told Reuters from the northern port city of Hamburg, where
he is studying for a postgraduate degree.
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2023/Apr/19/images/ads/current/LPL_small%201.gif)
"I feel like I need to speak up for Cao Zhixin and the other detained
protesters... I want to urge more global forces to pay attention to them
and Chinese people's efforts to struggle for their own freedom."
Immediately following the protests, in which hundreds took to the
streets in several cities across the country, police interrogated and
detained dozens of participants, according to rights group, lawyers and
friends of those individuals.
Many were only held for 24 hours or less or were released after a few
weeks in detention.
Reuters could not independently verify the total number of protesters
who were detained by police or have been charged and remain in custody.
But Human Rights Watch has said Cao, a 26-year-old book editor, is one
of four protesters who remain in detention in Beijing, having been
formally charged with "picking quarrels and provoking trouble", which
carries a sentence of up to five years.
Reuters could not reach Cao or her legal representatives but one of her
friends, who declined to be identified, confirmed she remains in
detention.
China's Public Security Bureau did not respond to a faxed request for
comment. The public security bureaus of Beijing and Shanghai could not
be reached for comment.
China has not commented officially on the protests, whether they
triggered the end of the zero-COVID policy or subsequent detentions. But
Xi reportedly told visiting European officials last December that
'frustrated students' were behind the protests.
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2023/Apr/19/images/ads/current/castlemanor_sda_FINANCIAL_2017.png)
[to top of second column]
|
![](../images/041923PIX/news_a28.jpg)
Yicheng Huang poses during an interview
with Reuters in Hamburg, Germany, April 17, 2023. REUTERS/Fanny
Brodersen
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2023/Apr/19/images/ads/current/graue_lda_SFARM_2023.png)
'EXTREME FEAR'
Huang said he still remembers clearly the evening of November 27,
when he saw "around 400 to 500" protesters near downtown Shanghai's
Wulumuqi Road, named after the city of Urumqi where a deadly
apartment blaze two days earlier triggered nationwide protest vigils
against COVID lockdowns.
The protests were initially peaceful, he said, as demonstrators
chanted slogans and held up blank sheets of paper as a symbol of
their discontent. But after nightfall, police started violently
arresting protesters en masse, he said.
"A group of police officers rushed forward and pinned me to the
ground, punching and kicking me. Then they grabbed me upside down
and dragged me along the ground while upside down. My chin was
bleeding profusely. I lost my glasses and shoes," he told Reuters.
He was then sat near the front of a police bus full of other
detained protesters. There, he witnessed police slapping and beating
several female protesters and managed to sneak out unnoticed amid
the chaos. On the street, Huang bumped into an acquaintance who led
him to a safe place away from the protest site, from where he caught
a taxi home.
His name had not been taken down by the police, he said.
After the protests ended, Huang kept a low profile and "lived in
exreme fear" of arrest while waiting for his student visa to travel
to Germany. He finally left China in late March, without having been
contacted by the police.
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2023/Apr/19/images/ads/current/safetytip_sda_patricklee_2023.png)
"The protesters who are still detained are young intellectuals and
creatives: editors, journalists, Shakespeare lovers," Huang said,
adding that they were neither seasoned activists or dissidents but
idealistic youngsters who acted spontaneously out of a sense of
justice.
"Over the past ten years, the space for us to exist - and the space
for civil society in China - has continued to shrink."
Huang said he believes that the demonstrations directly triggered
the end of the zero-COVID policy, but their lasting impact on China
comes at a price.
"Even though zero-COVID is over, these people who sacrificed their
freedom for us are still in prison," he said.
"As long as one protester is still detained, the world cannot stop
paying attention to the white paper movement."
(Reporting by Oliver Denzer in Hamburg and Laurie Chen in Beijing;
Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)
[© 2023 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.]This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Thompson Reuters is solely responsible for this content. |