AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL NEWS SERVICE 120/96

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AI INDEX: ASA 17/71/96 2 JULY 1996

CHINA: ONE THOUSAND EXECUTED IN "STRIKE HARD" CAMPAIGN AGAINST

CRIME

With at least a thousand people executed over the past two months

as part of a nationwide anti-crime campaign, Amnesty

International is demanding that the Chinese authorities

immediately stop further executions.

"This number of executions is shocking and will only serve

to fuel a climate of violence and vengeance," Amnesty

International said today.

"This is state killing on a massive scale -- the

international community should pressure China to stop such

widespread and arbitrary violation of the most basic right to

life."

The campaign -- termed "Yanda" ( "strike hard" or "severe

crackdown") -- is aimed at cracking down on serious crimes.

Intensive, and at times near hysterical, propaganda has been

carried out by the state media, with daily exhortations to "deal

a fatal blow" to criminals "so as to win a complete victory in

the campaign".

The campaign has led to a level of executions unprecedented

since 1983, when a similar nationwide anti-crime campaign

resulted in thousands of summary executions in less than three

months. The limited number of reports available to Amnesty

International so far show that tens of thousands of criminal

suspects have been arrested and at least a thousand people

executed since the start of the "strike hard" campaign on 28

April. Amnesty International believes the real number to be far

higher.

"Each year more people are executed in China than in the

rest of the world put together. With the strike hard' campaign,

China looks set to break its own record this year," Amnesty

International said. As in 1983, the vast majority of those

sentenced to death in the current campaign were immediately

executed after unfair and summary trials. The "strike hard"

crackdown is due to last until the end of July. A top Chinese

judicial official stated on 30 June that the campaign is now

entering its "third vital phase". "We are very concerned that the

pressure put upon the police and judiciary to crack' cases and

speed up prosecutions may also result in increased use of

torture to force confessions," Amnesty International said.

As a result of such official instructions, some people have

been executed within a few days of the crimes they allegedly

committed. In Jilin province, for example, three men were

executed on 31 May for allegedly robbing a car "loaded with bank

notes" on 21 May.

According to an official newspaper, the three men, Tian Zhijia,

Tian Zhiquan and Zhao Lian, were arrested on 24 May; they were

tried and sentenced to death during an "open meeting"on the

morning of 27 May -- three days after their arrest. One of the

defendants reportedly appealed against the verdict to the

provincial high court, but this was rejected on 28 May. The three

men were executed by firing squad on 31 May -- seven days after

their arrest and ten days after the offence was committed.

In another case in the same province, Tian Xiaowei, who was

accused of stabbing a policeman to death and injuring two others

on 13 May, was executed by firing squad on the morning of 20 May

-- barely seven days after the crime was committed.

While the campaign is said to be aimed at particularly

serious crimes, some people convicted of relatively minor

offences, such as theft, have also been executed. Repeat

offenders, escaped prisoners and members of "hooligan" or

criminal gangs are among the targets of the campaign. They may be

liable to the death penalty because of their alleged criminal

background rather than actual crimes.

The Chinese state media has been fully mobilized for the

campaign by central government and Communist Party authorities.

Arrests and executions have been publicized on a daily basis. In

an intensive propaganda campaign the Chinese state-run media has

repeatedly exhorted police and the judiciary to deal with

offenders "severely and swiftly" so as to "deal fatal blows to

criminals".

In an article launching the campaign on 29 April 1996, the

official newspaper People's Daily called on judicial and public

security personnel to "seriously adhere to the principle of

severely and quickly punishing criminals". An editorial in the

same newspaper on 15 May reiterated this need and went on to

state that whoever "deserves" the death penalty according to law

"must be sentenced to death". Similar injunctions were

repeatedly printed in major provincial newspapers.

Many mass rallies to try offenders or to announce arrests

and sentences have been shown on national and local television.

In Hubei province, for example, 20,000 people attended an "open

trial" rally held on 30 May in Erzhou city to announce the

"public arrest" of 41 offenders and the sentences passed on 70

others, including four who were sentenced to death and executed.

A local radio report on the rally stated that the "20,000 masses"

who had attended the event "all clapped their hands with joy".

The condemned prisoners paraded at such rallies usually had

their hands tied behind their back; some also had their feet

shackled and a rope around their neck. In Zhuhai city, for

example, 13 prisoners sentenced to death were paraded in

shackles in front of an audience of 600 people in mid-May, before

being led away to be shot. Three others executed in the same city

on 26 June were taken from the court to the execution ground in

an open truck, handcuffed and shackled, and with a rope round

their neck.

Those executed during the campaign include a man named Li

Xueyin, from central Hubei province, who was convicted of

murdering a family planning official who had forced Li's wife to

be sterilised according to the state family planning policy. In

Heiloingjiang province, three people, including two named as Hou

Liju and Ren Zhonglu, were executed in early June after being

convicted of stealing 104 farm cattle and 46 motorcycles,

bicycles and jeeps between December 1990 and June 1994.

International Anti-drugs Day on 26 June was marked by the

execution of more than 230 people in one day in several cities.

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