China's Qidong pipeline protest ends with guilty pleas
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-21271735 Version 0 of 1. Fourteen people have pleaded guilty to charges of "encouraging mass violence" during a protest in the city of Qidong, Chinese state media say. Government offices were stormed as thousands of people demonstrated against a proposed waste water pipeline project in July 2012. The project, which local people said would pollute coastal waters, was subsequently scrapped. Defendants would be sentenced at a later date, Xinhua news agency said. The protest was one of a series of high-profile incidents in which local people have objected to development or industrial projects on environmental grounds. In Qidong, the pipeline was proposed by a paper-making company. As thousands of people turned out, the local Communist Party chief and the mayor were stripped of their shirts by angry protesters who wanted them to wear T-shirts bearing an anti-pollution slogan. The 14 defendants were tried on Wednesday. Prosecutors said their "violent behaviour caused property losses, injured police officers and severely disrupted public order", Xinhua reported. |