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| Arrested Shanghai property protestors go on hunger strike
SHANGHAI, Oct 2 (AFP) - A group of Chinese protestors recently detained over their involvement in an ongoing property row have gone on a hunger strike to protest their arrest, a human rights group and Shanghai residents said Thursday. Some 85 people were detained by police on September 30 in Beijing ahead of China's October 1 National Day when they intended to petition authorities over massive urban redevelopment projects. Adaptive intelligence for a serious advantage: business, investment and technology- BizVantage! A number of Shanghai residents among the arrested have gone on a hunger strike to protest their detention and abusive police treatment, city locals and the Human Rights in China (HRIC) organisation said. "I heard from one of the detainees that they were planning on going on a hunger strike," Wang Wenzhen, a Shanghai dweller involved in the real estate dispute, told AFP. "They are being held in Mengzi Road and another place in Qingpu district," Wang said. "None has been released yet." Police were unavailable for comment, but they reportedly told the detainees they would remain in custody for 15 days, during which they would be subjected to "training sessions to correct their thinking." The police action specifically targeted Hong Kong resident Shen Ting (Shum Ting), who has been assisting her parents in their property-related claims against the government, the report said. However, Shen's father told AFP she had not been picked up and had safely returned to Hong Kong from Beijing. Authorities were also reportedly grilling them on their contacts with international media and also trying to force detainees to make statements that could be used to expedite the criminal prosecution of Zheng Enchong, a disbarred activist Shanghai lawyer. Zheng, 53, was put on trial on August 28 for revealing state secrets as a result of the legal assistance he provided to residents in disputes over urban redevelopment projects. The accusation of "illegally providing state secrets to entities outside of China," is a catch-all charge commonly used by Chinese authorites against those perceived to be enemies of the state. A verdict on the case is pending. The human rights group also said that about 200 relatives of the detainees staged a protest in front of the Shanghai municipal government offices on the morning of October 1. A number of those protesters were arrested but later released. Both incidents are the latest in a series of demonstrations over the past several months in which hundreds of people have been apprehended in the increasingly acrimonious dispute between the government, real estate developers and residents in China's cities. In two separate occurrences in Beijing last week, a man set himself on fire while a group of about 100 people peacefully marched on government buildings to express their discontent with property development policies. Residents claim they have been pushed out of housing due to government approved urban clearance projects, with many of them left homeless. One group of dwellers in Shanghai earlier this year filed a lawsuit on behalf of 2,159 people, who allege that one of China's richest property tycoons Zhou Zhengyi cheated them out of fair compensation for their property. A court upheld in late August the government land transfers that allowed Zhou to redevelop the area. bms/rmj/jfs China-property-protest-rights
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