Chinese activist goes missing after helping to organise shoe factory strike
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Version 0 of 1. A prominent Chinese labour activist has been missing for more than 24 hours and his wife suspects he was detained by state security agents after trying to help organise workers involved in China's biggest strike in years. Zhang Zhiru was last heard from when he spoke to his wife, Xiao Hongxia, by telephone at around noon on Tuesday. He told her he had been summoned to a meeting with state security agents from the industrial southern city of Dongguan. Workers have been on strike since April 14 over social insurance payments at a Yue Yuen Industrial Holdings shoe factory complex with about 40,000 employees. Labour activists say the strike, in the town of Gaobu, just outside Dongguan, is one of China's biggest since market reforms started in the late 1970s. "When he went out in the morning he said he was meeting Dongguan state security," Xiao said by telephone from Shenzhen, where Zhang lives. "Yesterday afternoon, and at night when it was very late and he had not come home, a lot of us tried to call him, but couldn't get through." Zhang's mobile phone appeared to be off when Reuters tried to call him on Wednesday. The Ministry of State Security is the Chinese equivalent of the KGB in the former Soviet Union – an intelligence-gathering agency that also suppresses dissent and other activities it deems threats to Communist party rule. A man surnamed Wang who answered the telephone at the agency's Dongguan branch said he had not heard of Zhang's possible detention. Zhang had been following the Yue Yuen strike closely and was working with other activists and lawyers to try to help the workers organise to press their demands. Lin Dong, a colleague of Zhang's at the Shenzhen Chunfeng Labour Dispute Service centre, may also have been detained, Xiao said. Calls to the centre went unanswered. Early last week Zhang tried to travel to Gaobu to meet workers but was detained by police briefly and sent back to Shenzhen, he told Reuters on Friday. On Monday, however, Zhang and a lawyer involved in labour issues went to Gaobu and met several workers to discuss their options, said Wang Jiangsong, a Beijing-based labour researcher. "That's why this has happened," said Wang, referring to Zhang's possible detention. "But there was nothing wrong with what they did, trying to help the workers." Zhang is no stranger to pressure from the authorities, and Xiao said he had been detained briefly several times in the past. His labour dispute centre has been forced to move twice since mid-March and is facing a third move. He said he believed authorities had put pressure on his landlords to evict him. The Yue Yuen complex covers 1.4m sq m of floor space, according to its website. It makes shoes for Adidas, Nike, Saucony and other global brands, workers said. |