--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Now this is what pisses me off when people tell me "you are too sensitive about racism...just ignore it" I'm sure anyone can ignore a baton to the head.
I put this in Shanghai expat Forum and they made fun of it. And said it was good for us
one even said....."Good job Beijing Police!"
http://www.shanghaiexpat.com/index.php?name=MDForum&file=viewtopic&p=729214#729214 this is where I posted it
I really despise whites in China.
{ 2007 09 25 }
Crude drug raid highlights ignorance of Beijing’s police
I’m an unavoidable day late with this post but I think there are a few things to add regarding the drug raid in Beijing’s main bar district Sanlitun on Friday night, particularly as the Reuters report (via the Guardian) only touches upon the story:
BEIJING, Sept 24 (Reuters) - Chinese paramilitary police swept through a busy bar district in Beijing, detaining about 20 African nationals suspected of selling drugs, witnesses said.
The raid at midnight on Friday in fashionable Sanlitun, also home to many embassies, came as police tighten security ahead of a Communist Party meeting in mid-October and next year’s Olympic Games.
“The paramilitary police sealed off the street at both ends, then moved in,” said a witness surnamed Wang.
“Some Africans entered the vans peacefully but others tried to flee and the police used force,” added Wang, who works on the street frequented by young foreigners.
Other witnesses said the troops targeted anyone on the street with dark skin.
The Ministry of Public Security and the Beijing police both declined immediate comment. Chinese police rarely get involved with foreigners if they can help it, owing mainly to poor foreign language skills.
As we can see from the South China Morning Post article below, the key point is the wild nature of the police operation in which anyone who was black was targeted.
Dozens of black tourists and expatriates, including the son of the Grenadian ambassador, were arrested and some badly beaten during an apparently indiscriminate anti-drug operation by Beijing police.
About 30 men, mostly African or Caribbean, were detained as dozens of baton-wielding security guards and uniformed police swept through Beijing’s nightlife district, Sanlitun. Students, tourists and the ambassador’s son Joslyn Whiteman Jnr were among those wrestled to the ground, handcuffed and hauled to a nearby police station.
At least three people, including Mr Whiteman, were beaten with rubber truncheons despite few signs that they were resisting arrest.
Grenadian ambassador Joslyn Whiteman said he was furious at the way his son was treated. The 22-year-old spent a night in hospital with a concussion.
“Obviously I’m very angry,” the ambassador said. “My son was arrested and beaten for no reason whatsoever. I will be taking this up with the authorities and looking into the matter.”
Witnesses said the round-up appeared to be aimed squarely at black men. Those who tried to photograph the incident were made to delete the images from their mobile phones and cameras.
“It was pretty brutal,” Beijing-based magazine editor Alex Reid said.
“I saw a man being beaten by six guys in camouflage. He was covered in blood. The police seemed to be targeting anyone who was black.”
Thabo Lieket, a 24-year-old student from Lesotho, was among those arrested and later released without charge. He thought the police assumed he was dealing in drugs because he was black, he said.
“They were rounding up all the black people; it was pretty frightening,” he said. “I was walking with some friends past one of the bars when I was grabbed by some of the guys in camouflage. They dragged us all to the police station, where we were put in the same cell.”
When asked about the incident, a police officer at the Sanlitun station said: “This is an anti-drug operation.”
I have no doubt the SCMP report can be taken as read as I consider the author of the article - housemate, friend of ten years and a member of my journalism class - to be a very reliable source. He was present at the scene of the chaos on Friday night, having a beer outside the Saddle bar opposite Tongli Studios. I feel it is worth detailing exactly what happened, away from the constraints of a limited word count and the news story format.
At about 1am, a group of five or six men in camouflage uniform charged past the Saddle towards Poachers’ Inn. Their average age was around 18 and 19 - some looked as young as 16, others maybe 25 - and their scruffy appearance, straggly hair and gangly limbs made them look decidedly amateurish. They do not seem to deserve the title “paramilitary police” given to them by the Reuters’ witness. A few Saddle patrons, including the SCMP reporter, followed them and saw three black men kneeling in the street surrounded by a group of about seven camouflaged men and three in Beijing police uniform. One man was handcuffed and was being beaten by foot-long batons, while he shouted his protestations; the other two were being threatened with blows. The policemen, much older than the camouflaged mob, were making sure onlookers stayed back. One was holding a gun but not pointing it with purpose. At no stage did the SCMP reporter see any resistance that warranted this kind of treatment but he didn’t see if the men had tried to resist arrest in the first place.
The three men were hauled up and taken to the police station around the corner. Many people were taking pictures and video footage. The SCMP reporter followed the police but his friend had to stay behind for a moment as the police deleted the pictures she had taken with her digital camera. She was allowed to keep two photos of blood on the pavement. Many others were forced to delete the images they had taken. By the way, someone has video footage (haven’t seen it myself) of this incident so I hope it will be online shortly.
The SCMP reporter stood with several other foreigners outside the police station. There was a feeling of indignation, disgust and the sense that they should at least make their presence felt so the police would know they were being observed. It should be said at this point the incident still appeared to be the arrest of three black men on the suspicion of dealing drugs. The picture changed over the next hour, however, as snatch squads of five to six young men in camouflage kept running out of the station and returning with more arrests, all black men. It was becoming clear that the teams were being sent out to the bars and told to bring back anyone who was black. By 2am, 20 to 30 men had been arrested, ranging from a tourist and a student (quoted in SCMP article) to possible drug dealers and the son of the Grenadian ambassador. One man was led in with his shoulder covered in blood.
The police began to release people without charge at about 2.15am. Those with valid passports and visas were allowed to go - the student from Lesotho was lucky enough to remember his passport number. Outside the station, the SCMP reporter spoke to a white Canadian guy. He had been drinking with a fellow student, who was black, in a bar until his drinking buddy was snatched from under his eyes and dragged outside into the street. The reporter spoke to two black men who had been arrested in separate incidents. Their Chinese friends had warned them that police appeared to be rounding up anyone who was black and carting them off. Worried, they left the bar and were grabbed by the camouflaged mob, rather than men in police uniform. It is no wonder some innocent people were caught trying to run away.
The SCMP reporter and two of his friends then entered the police station and propped up the counter. One of his friends was nagging the police, firing questions at them. They answered two questions and volunteered a justification in the course of an hour. “What are you doing?” “This is an anti-drug operation.” “Why are you beating the people?” “Because they tried to run away.” This was followed by, “You’re an American. The police in America beat people too.” According to the SCMP reporter, most of the staff in the police station looked bemused at the foreigners’ bemusement.
The Grenadian ambassador Joslyn Whiteman, and his wife, arrived at about 2.30am, angry and distressed but grateful to the foreigners that they had stayed around the police station. He even had the good humour to comment that he was the only “white man” in the building. After giving the police a description of his son to a policewoman who spoke some English, he was told his son had been released. They found him later and took him to hospital where he stayed overnight due to truncheon-induced concussion.
China Expat has written a post that addresses the racial implications of this incident. I will focus on the shocking baseness of the policework and sheer ignorance of the authorities involved. It is unclear to whom the young men in camouflage were affiliated. From the description of their appearance, I find it hard to accept they belonged to either the police or the military. It sounds like some kind of security company made up of untrained youths hired by the Beijing police to do their dirty work. This ensures that no one has video or photographic evidence of a uniformed Beijing policeman dishing out a beating with a baton. But it also demonstrates the clumsiness in the way the police carried out the anti-drug operation. The overwhelming majority of drug dealers in Sanlitun are black Africans and the way in which they conduct business is blatant. The simple combination of surveillance and plain clothes could notch up an arrest a day at least. Instead, it appears the logic was: drug dealers are black so if we round up enough black people we will catch some drug dealers. If they show fear or resist then they are guilty.
Maybe the police prefer a public show of its strength to act as a deterrant and to demonstrate their unerring efforts to combat drugs in line with the Minister of Public Security’s call to clamp down … etc … ahead of the Party congress. Well in this case, it has forgotten its audience. Too many appalled foreigners, too many foreigners with links to the media. If their thinking is that the rough treatment will convince the drug dealers to go straight, then they are surely misguided. The incident had the appearance of being all for show and it has received negative coverage in the media. There won’t be any further drug raids in Sanlitun for a while so it appears it is now safe to peddle illegal substances on its streets. It does appear to be a very localised effort to make a few drug-related arrests. If the Beijing police have aspirations of ridding drug-dealing from the capital’s streets then it should adopt a more citywide approach. After all, it is well known that most of the drug dealers have relocated to another area of Beijing over the last year or so. When I first arrived in Beijing at the beginning of 2006, a stroll down the busy main road of Gongti Beilu would be to the soundtrack of “Hey, man” from African drug dealers. This just doesn’t seem to happen anymore.
As for the bar district of Sanlitun, I often find there is a tinge of aggression in the air, particularly outside Tongli Studios (the area where the police raid occurred). Probably no more than outside De Niro’s in Newmarket, H2O in Bishop’s Stortford, Jumping Jack’s in Harlow or any other of the small-town nightclubs in which I had the opportunity to meet many of the UK’s leading fools during my teenage years. But a tinge nonetheless, accentuated in my mind perhaps because Beijing is generally free from all the loutish (why do I feel so much older than my years when I use that word?) nonsense that goes on in Britain. It does seem that lashings of violence in Sanlitun, like the one written about on the Zhongnanhai blog here, are happening more frequently though.
Related links:
Africa Beat -
http://jenbrea.typepad.com/africabeat/2007/09/africans-beaten.html#com ments
Newsweek blog -
http://blog.newsweek.com/blogs/ov/archive/2007/09/25/beijing-vice-a-br utal-bust-reveals-the-strong-arm-of-the-chinese-law.aspx
http://www.beijingnewspeak.com/2007/09/28/sanlitun-saga-update-anti-dr ug-operation-uncovers-no-drugs/
AfroShanghai
Author