Hundreds of residents in the southeastern Chinese city of Guangzhou have taken to the streets to protest the tight restrictions in place to contain the COVID-19 pandemic, with surprisingly violent scenes including citizens overturning a security force vehicle.
Social media has served as a loudspeaker for protests in which police barricades have been knocked down in Haizhu district, where a lockdown has been in place since October to contain the spread of a coronavirus outbreak. The area is mainly home to low-income people who need to return to work, reports the BBC.
China’s Ministry of Health reported more than 17,000 new coronavirus positives on Monday, the worst figure since April, according to Bloomberg. Of these, more than 5,100 correspond to Canton, which has several districts completely closed waiting for a reduction of the contagion curve that has not yet arrived.
Messages about the «riots» in this megacity have circulated on social networks such as Weibo and WeChat and once again highlight a citizen unrest that had already become palpable in other similar contexts, both in urban centers and in stores or factories confined by surprise.
The government, however, regularly defends its ‘zero cases’ policy at all levels, including the recent congress that re-elected the current president, Xi Jinping, for a third term at the head of the Asian giant. He argues that health protection and economic stability can be reconciled.
