Lockdown protests erupted on Sunday in Shanghai, several universities in Beijing and other cities across China, where anger is mounting at the draconian “zero Covid” policy.
A video widely circulated on the Internet shows some protesters shouting "Xi Jinping, resign!"
and also attacking the Chinese Communist Party, a very rare demonstration of hostility against the president and the regime in the economic capital of the country, subjected at the beginning of the year to an exhausting two-month confinement.
Demonstration of several hundred or even a few thousand people in #Shanghai this evening, in particular against the #ZeroCovid strategy and its consequences.
"We want freedom!", "Xi Jinping resignation!"pic.twitter.com/CmECfXenMR
— Nicolas Berrod (@nicolasberrod) November 26, 2022
This protest took place at dawn in Wulumuqi Street - the Mandarin name for the city of Urumqi in Xinjiang where ten people died in a fire on Thursday.
Many posts circulating on social networks in China accuse the anti-Covid measures of having aggravated this tragedy by slowing down the arrival of relief.
A person who took part in the protests in Shanghai said, on condition of anonymity, that he arrived at around two in the morning at the rally.
“A group of mourners laid flowers on the sidewalk, another group chanted slogans,” said this witness.
“There were a few minor scuffles but overall the policing was civilized,” he continued.
"It's crazy to know that in these circumstances, there are still so many brave people who stand out," he exclaimed.
Video taken by a witness showed a large crowd shouting as they waved sheets of white paper - symbolizing censorship - in front of several cordons of police.
Several witnesses reported that at least two people were taken away by the security forces.
Sunday during the day, the neighborhood had become quiet again, under a strong police presence.
Demonstration on a Beijing campus
Several hundred students from the prestigious Tsinghua University in Beijing also demonstrated on their campus on Sunday, according to an eyewitness interviewed by AFP and images posted on social networks.
“At 11:30 a.m. (4:30 a.m. in Paris), students began to wave signs at the entrance to the canteen.
Then more and more people joined them.
Now there are between 200 and 300 people.
We sang the national anthem and the Internationale and chanted:
Liberty will triumph
, ”explained this student.
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Vigils in memory of the Urumqi victims have been held at other universities across the country, including the equally prestigious Peking University, according to a student who attended.
According to this witness, slogans against the “zero Covid” policy were drawn on a wall of this university, the protesters began to gather on Saturday evening around midnight on campus, and the crowd reached between 100 and 200 people around two hours of the morning.
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Videos on social media also showed a major vigil at the Nanjing Institute of Communications where participants also held up white sheets of paper.
Other videos, the authenticity of which AFP was unable to confirm, showed other small protests in Xian (center), Guangzhou (south) and Wuhan (center).
Authorities were quick to restrict online discussions of the protests and delete videos.
China recorded 39,506 Covid cases on Sunday, a daily record that remains very low compared to figures recorded elsewhere in the world at the height of the pandemic.