2015-04-08
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Residents of Langtang protest outside the gates of the Huarun Cement Factory in Guangdong province, April 7, 2015.
Photo courtesy of a protester
Primary school children boycotted class in Langtang township near Guangdong’s Yunfu city on Wednesday, joining a continuing protest by thousands of residents over plans to build a waste incinerator plant near their homes, residents said.
Tensions remained high in the township amid ongoing police detentions by night and a growing security presence on local streets, they said.
Thousands of Langtang residents had initially protested outside the gates of the Huarun Cement Factory, but have since turned the focus of their protest towards the local government since being forced away from the site on Tuesday, local sources told RFA.
“[The class boycott] has gone on for two days now,” a Langtang resident surnamed Wu told RFA, adding that security in the surrounding towns and villages remains tight.
“Yesterday evening, they came into our village to arrest people,” Wu said. “Today, there is a police guard surrounding several villages.”
“There are still a lot of people gathered in [Langtang] township,” he said.
A second resident surnamed Zhang said tensions remained high in Langtang after the government failed to release protesters detained in Monday’s clashes, as promised.
“The government is sending people here to make arrests, the police have entered two villages and made arrests,” Zhang said.
“The government told us that if we left the cement factory, they would release them half an hour afterwards, but they still haven’t released them, even after we left,” he said.
He said some 1,000 extra police had been drafted in to reinforce those already in Langtang.
“There are an extra 1,000 police in the township now, and more than 20 police vehicles at the cement factory,” Zhang said.
