As world leaders congratulated China on its Oct. 1 Nationwide Day, protesters gathered in cities world wide to protest towards the ruling Chinese language Communist Get together (CCP)’s ongoing persecution of ethnic minorities and dissidents.
Because the leaders of North Korea and Vietnam despatched effusive letters of congratulation to Beijing to mark the 73rd anniversary of the founding of the Folks’s Republic of China (PRC) in 1949, protesters in London burned the Chinese language flag, and threw maggots and dung on it outdoors the Chinese language embassy, in protest at Beijing’s human rights document.
Hong Kongers, Tibetans and Uyghurs organized round 15 protests in U.Okay. cities to mark the 73rd Nationwide Day and “say no to the CCP,” as Russian president Vladimir Putin, Cuban president Miguel Diaz-Canel and Cambodian King Norodom Sihamoni added their congratulations, in line with state information company Xinhua.
Chanting “China lied! Folks died! Disgrace on the CCP!”, the demonstrators marched from Piccadilly Circus to the Chinese language embassy, carrying placards opposing totalitarian rule by the CCP.
The flames have been put out after police arrived on the scene, after which protesters shone laser pointers on the embassy home windows. No response was noticed from the embassy, though some curtains have been closed.
A protester surnamed Wong, who emigrated to the U.Okay. two months in the past, stated she had taken half within the protest with three generations of her household president.
“What this present day teaches us is that we misplaced our freedoms due to the occasion,” Wong instructed RFA. “I do not suppose it is a day to rejoice, however a day when an axis of evil was established.”
“The CCP hasn’t simply harmed Hong Kong, however the entire nation,” she stated. “It is usually exploiting freedoms world wide … for instance abstaining from the U.N. vote on Russia.”
“To me, it is a horrible, evil regime.”
Misplaced freedoms
Wong stated she as soon as used to take her youngsters on marches in Hong Kong, however since a crackdown on public dissent beneath the nationwide safety regulation, she has solely been in a position to train that proper within the U.Okay.
A protester surnamed Tse stated he was carrying the colonial-era Hong Kong flag on the protest, to specific nostalgia for town’s misplaced freedoms.
“We would like a Hong Kong with freedom, democracy and the rule of regulation like we had up to now,” Tse instructed RFA. “Hong Kong folks ought to have the ultimate say in [how to run] the place, not the nation subsequent door.”
“They’ve trampled on the guarantees made to the folks of Hong Kong, the commitments made within the [1984] Sino-British Joint Declaration and on its promise to the world,” he stated. “Did they as soon as ask the folks of Hong Kong [what they thought?]”
A protester surnamed Leung stated there isn’t a longer any separation of powers in Hong Kong, since Beijing imposed the nationwide safety regulation on town from July 1, 2020.
“Hong Kong used to have separation of powers, however now that has been denied us,” Leung stated. “Everybody desires to get Hong Kong again to the one nation, two programs standing that it had earlier than.”
Uyghur dissident Rahima Mahmut instructed the rally that, because the PRC was based 73 years in the past, Tibet and Xinjiang have been occupied, the Cultural Revolution introduced political turmoil to China, and the CCP had bloodily suppressed dissent within the 1989 Tiananmen bloodbath.
Hong Kong’s freedoms and democracy have been destroyed, and Uyghurs have suffered genocide, together with the mass incarceration of Uyghurs of their properties for greater than a month with out meals as a part of CCP chief Xi Jinping’s zero-COVID coverage, she instructed the group.
However she stated Uyghurs refused to stay silent, regardless of dealing with fixed threats from brokers of the Chinese language state whereas in exile abroad.
Berkeley protest
In the US, protesters gathered on the campus of the College of California, Berkeley on Oct. 1, waving the Tibetan flag, the colonial-era flag of Hong Kong and inserting a tombstone effigy inscribed with the an estimated loss of life toll beneath CCP rule since Mao Zedong proclaimed the Folks’s Republic of China from Tiananmen podium on Oct. 1, 1949.
The protest, which included the flags of the anti-communist South Vietnam, the Philippines and the Myanmar Democratic Motion, was timed to coincide with a go to to the college by Zhang Jianmin, the Chinese language consul in San Francisco, to participate within the Berkeley China Summit symposium.
Chanting “Free Tibet!”, “Free Hong Kong!” and “Free the Uyghurs!”, the protesters additionally hung a placard which learn “I do know what you probably did within the Czech Republic” on a tree outdoors the constructing.
Chen Guodong, a member of the Asian-American political group Far East Youth Freedom League, stated protesters had additionally introduced alongside a portrait of late Czech official Jaroslav Kubera, who died of a coronary heart assault in workplace shortly after receiving a threatening message from the Chinese language embassy within the Czech Republic, in line with his relations.
“Mr Kubera handed away [in 2020], when he was about to go to Taiwan,” Chen stated. “He was threatened by Zhang Jianmin and died shortly after [so we believe] Zhang Jianmin has blood on his fingers.”
Kubera’s widow has stated her husband was threatened by Zhang as he attended a banquet on the Chinese language embassy three days earlier than his loss of life, and that letters from Zhang containing related threats have been additionally discovered amongst her husband’s private results after his loss of life.
A member of the scholar group Hong Kong Affairs Affiliation of Berkeley, who gave solely the nickname Will, instructed the rally that anybody attending the Berkeley China Summit was “supporting a tyrannical regime with their silence.”
Occupied Tibet
Tenzin Dorji, a member of the Northern California Tibetan Affiliation, stated he took half to protest the unlawful occupation of Tibet by the CCP.
“The CCP has illegally occupied Tibet, and Tibetans are struggling a genocide beneath its brutal rule,” he stated.
A protester from the southern Chinese language province of Guangdong, who gave solely the surname Ng, instructed the rally he was there to talk out for the Cantonese nativist motion, which is making an attempt to withstand the erasure of Cantonese language and tradition beneath the CCP.
Protest motorcades additionally turned out in San Gabriel, Los Angeles, and Park Metropolis, Montreal, with indicators that learn “Destroy the CCP!”
The LA protest took a detour to soak up the Chinese language consulate within the metropolis, the place a bunch of protesters that included Tibetans and Uyghurs burned the Chinese language flag.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken provided his congratulations to “the folks of China” on Nationwide Day, Xinhua reported.
“As the US works with the worldwide neighborhood to deal with the nice obstacles the world faces in the present day, we welcome the cooperation of the Folks’s Republic of China in addressing international challenges in well being, local weather change, counternarcotics, and different areas the place our pursuits intersect,” Blinken stated.
Translated and edited by Luisetta Mudie.