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China must avoid force in Mongolia: Amnesty
Agence France Presse - May 28, 2011
Robert Saiget, Beijing – Leading rights group Amnesty urged China Saturday to avoid a violent crackdown on ethnic Mongolian protesters, who have engaged in five days of protests against Chinese rule in Inner Mongolia.
Authorities have imposed martial law in some areas of the region in northern China, including Shuluun Huh, where more than 300 riot police clashed with hundreds of herders and students Friday, the New York-based Southern Mongolian Human Rights Information Centre said.
The unrest was sparked by the May 10 death of a Mongol herder, allegedly run over by a truck driven by a member of China's dominant Han ethnic group. Amnesty said the truck driver had been arrested and charged.
"Chinese authorities must respect freedom of expression and assembly (and) avoid using unnecessary or excessive force in policing these protests," Catherine Baber, Asia-Pacific director of London-based Amnesty International, said.
"Given the heavy-handed repression of similar protests in other regions, like Xinjiang and Tibet, there are real grounds for concern about the situation in Inner Mongolia."
China is home to an estimated six million ethnic Mongols who have cultural links with the Republic of Mongolia to the north, and who have long accused Beijing of political and cultural oppression.
The current protests have alleged Chinese encroachment on traditional pasturelands by Han mining and energy interests.
Local television stations reported that the heavy-handed crackdown was the only way to handle the protests, the information centre said.
The Internet in the region has also been slowed, while chatrooms run by the popular Tencent website have been shut down.
Schools in restive areas have been sealed off by police, including the Inner Mongolia Nationality University in Tongliao and the Hohhot City Nationality University, the centre said.
On Saturday, locals in the Left Ujumchin area, known as Xiwuqi in Chinese, where protests have taken place, told AFP by phone that the county seat was quiet due to a massive security presence locking down protest sites.
Telephones at government offices, police stations and schools in the region went unanswered.
Many in Inner Mongolia complain their plight has been overshadowed internationally by ethnic unrest in Tibet and Xinjiang, which also harbour similar grievances against Chinese rule.
Mongols in the region have told AFP by phone there is also growing anger over the disappearance of Hada, China's most prominent ethnic Mongol dissident.
Hada completed a 15-year jail term in December imposed after he called for ethnic Mongol rights, but his supporters say that he and his wife Xinna and their son Uiles have since vanished into police custody.
Calls for further protests over the coming week were being circulated among Mongols on the Internet, an ethnic Mongol in the regional capital Hohhot, who asked not to be named, told AFP Friday.
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