The big Chinese cities woke up today in apparent calm after cities like beijing tight security measures will be lifted following last weekend’s protests against the official policy of “zero covid”.
The authorities reacted to the unprecedented protest that brought together hundreds of people by increasing police deployment last night and fencing off areas of the Chinese capital with the intention of preventing the marches from repeating themselves.
On social networks like Twitterprohibited in the Asian country, some Internet users say that the police have been checking the phones of passers-by to take note of their identities in case they use banned applications like that or how Telegramwhich some users blame for being behind the protests.
Nevertheless, Videos from Sunday’s protests show how some of the protesters challenge the theory that “foreign forces” had something to do with the callsand they assure that they were there of their own free will.
Blank papers against censorship
The protesters Not only are they showing their discontent with the “zero covid” but, on some occasions, they have gone so far as to demand the resignation of the president of the country, Xi Jinpingpraised in recent years by the official press as the main coordinator of China’s anti-pandemic policy.
Also, in recent days, Another of the great points of friction has been the prevailing censorship in the countrywhich excluded from the list of trends on the Weibo social network -the local equivalent of Twitter- the tag that discussed the death of 10 people in an apparently confined building in Urumqi (northwest), the event that unleashed the wave of indignation.
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After that, some netizens posted articles on WeChat that only consisted of words like “fine”, “yes” or “okay”, protesting the systematic removal of content critical of the authorities’ performance.
In fact, one of the symbols of the protests that took place in several of the country’s large cities are the blank pages, which precisely represent the discontent of citizens for not being able to express their opinions, in this case through banners with slogans of support to the victims of Urumqi or critics of the health policies of the Government.
The controversy over the pages caused the important stationery company M&G to have to issue a statement yesterday denying the rumors circulating on networks that pointed out that the authorities had prohibited it from continuing to sell A4 paper to try to prevent the protests from continuing.
The future of protests and Zero Covid
While the official press remains silent about the protests, the influential and controversial commentator Hu Xijin, former director of the nationalist newspaper Global Times, did allude to them today, although he assured that “public opinion will calm down soon” after a possible relaxation of the restrictions.
Despite the fact that there is still no official announcement in this regard, the State Council (the Chinese Executive) has called a press conference for this afternoon regarding the latest developments in the fight against the pandemic.
“China is not going to get chaotic or out of control,” Hu said, specifying that the rate of serious cases is currently 0.025% in the country. He added: “Most Chinese are no longer afraid of getting infected. China could escape the shadow of covid-19 sooner than expected.
In his Weibo account – the Chinese equivalent of Twitter, censored in the country – Hu was more cautious when it came to expressing himself. He spoke of “recent sensitive incidents”, for which he partially blamed “external forces”, a common resource of the Chinese authorities when responding to protests or demonstrations of citizen discontent.
Nevertheless, many analysts do not believe that China will end the “zero covid” after the protests: “If strict controls are abandoned, the capacity of Chinese hospitals would be exceeded and the death rate (from covid) would be higher than what Chinese leaders could tolerate,” said the consultancy Trivium China.
In the opinion of its experts, most of the restrictions will be maintained, but the protests would have served to pressure local governments and apply the 20 measures recently announced by Beijing to try to minimize the social and economic impact of “zero covid“.
For his part, the chief economist for Asia at the Capital Economics consultancy, Mark Williams, believes that the big question is whether the protests will continue: “Maybe, after the weekend, there will be fewer people willing to take to the streets.
The areas where the protests took place have been cordoned off and there have been some arrests. Censorship on social networks has also increased. All of this could be enough for the protests to fade.”
However, if the demonstrations continue, Williams believes the authorities could opt for a crackdown campaign similar to the one carried out in Hong Kong against the 2019 pro-democracy protests.with bans on gatherings in public places, mass arrests and “drastic legal measures against those perceived as instigators.”
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EFE International news agency based in Madrid and present in more than 110 countries.