WUKAN, China — Villagers who had carried out a prominent protest against what they called land seizures by officials and business people agreed on Wednesday to halt their demonstrations after more than 10 days of keeping Communist Party authorities out of their village. The protests ended after a leader of the villagers met on Wednesday morning with senior officials from coastal Guangdong Province in southern China.
The provincial officials agreed to the meeting after residents here threatened to march on Wednesday to government offices in the nearby city of Lufeng. In the meeting, which lasted for more than an hour outside Wukan, two senior provincial officials spoke to Lin Zuluan, 65, one of the villagers’ main representatives. Mr. Lin said after the meeting that the officials had agreed to three conditions set by the protesters, including freeing several villagers who had been detained, though the issue of the land sales remained unresolved.
“I was satisfied with how the meeting went,” Mr. Lin said. “Now they’ve opened up a new channel of communication, and it will help to build a closer relationship between the two sides.”
On Wednesday afternoon, Mr. Lin and other village leaders met to discuss their options and decided to call off the public protests and to reopen access to the village. It was unclear whether party officials who fled earlier would return and resume their jobs.
After that conclave, the village leaders held a rally with more than 1,000 residents in a public square and told the audience about the new agreement. When the villagers then dispersed, they took down protest banners hanging up near the square.
The meeting was the first with province-level officials, and it contrasted sharply with the denunciations and threats of arrest that have defined the official response to the protests since the standoff began.
