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Demobilized soldiers riot in China
2007-09-14
Demobilized soldiers rioted at a retraining center in northeastern China overnight, the latest in a series of apparently coordinated protests against living conditions, a teacher and a human rights monitoring group said Friday. About 1,000 ex-soldiers began smashing up classrooms and dormitories at the Qiqihar Railway Institute late Thursday night using beer bottles, the Hong Kong-based Information Center for Human Rights and Democracy said. It said they then attempted to break out of the school, heading for the city train station, but were blocked by police and armed special forces. The clashes intensified when additional demobilized soldiers flocked to the school after hearing a rumor that two ex-soldiers had been killed, the center said in a statement. In all, at least 10 people were injured and five arrested, it said, without identifying the injured as rioters or police. A teacher at the school who gave only his surname, Wang, confirmed the clashes had occurred, but said the situation was now calm and classes had resumed. However, Wang said all the demobilized soldiers had been removed from campus, confirming the Hong Kong center's claim that all 6,000 demobilized soldiers recently placed at railway institutes in several cities had been ordered to return to their homes. "All the retired soldiers are gone," Wang told The Associated Press by phone from the school, 650 miles northeast of Beijing. The violence comes just over one week after about 2,000 demobilized Chinese soldiers rioted at training centers in at least three cities. The reported protests, which authorities refused to confirm, were notable for their level of coordination, something not seen on a nationwide scale since the 1989 pro-democracy demonstrations in Beijing and several other cities. Ex-troops were angered by run-down dormitories, bad but expensive food and a lack of study materials, according to the center and Internet reports. China has been steadily cutting the size of its 2.3 million-member armed forces, but many of those demobilized have reportedly struggled to find jobs. About 560,000 officers and men were due to be retired from the service this year, with panicked servicemen paying large bribes to obtain jobs in the more developed cities for fear of being sent back to their hometowns, the Hong Kong center said.
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