Police injured as residents protest incinerator in China

BEIJING – A protest on Sunday against an incinerator in a southern Chinese town turned violent as some people attempted to break into government offices and police were injured, residents and authorities said.

The protest in Lubu town in Guangdong province concerned a project led by the city government that administers the town to build an incinerator that would also generate power.

Residents reached by phone said they had spontaneously taken to the streets in their thousands because they fear the incinerator might contaminate the air and drinking water.

The protest was sparked by an announcement Saturday afternoon by Lubu town government that land requisition work for the project and the project itself were being stopped, without giving any reason.

Residents said that people were concerned that the project had been just temporarily stopped and not cancelled. “The notice was released by Lubu town government, but the project is led by Zhaoqing city government so the notice issued by the town government is not enough,” said a resident and restaurant worker who would only gave his surname, Yu.

He estimated that about 10,000 people had earlier gathered at the town’s main street and near a national highway, and that 3,000 or more police officers were present.

A propaganda department of Zhaoqing city’s Gaoyao district, which oversees Lubu town with a population of more than 70,000, said that police were injured.

In a post on its official Twitter-like Sina Weibo account, Gaoyao’s Communist Party committee propaganda department said that around noon “some ordinary people who are unaware of the truth led by some troublemakers attempted to storm the Lubu town government” and attacked and injured some police officers who were trying to maintain order. It said those people should surrender themselves to police and people at the offices should leave the site immediately.

A man who answered the phone at the propaganda department said he could give no more details. A man who picked up the phone at Lubu town police station said he wasn’t authorized to talk to the media. A woman from Lubu town government said there had been no protest at all and hung up.

The post by the Gaoyao propaganda department was taken down later Sunday afternoon. Photos of the protest also posted on Sina Weibo had earlier apparently been taken down by censors.

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Associated Press news assistant Henry Hou contributed to this report.