Newsdesk: Police open fire on Tibetans in Lhasa

KATHMANDU—–Chinese police fired on rioting Tibetan protesters in Lhasa on Friday, killing at least two people, as Tibetans torched cars and shops and anti-Chinese demonstrators surged through the streets of the regional capital, Radio Free Asia (RFA) reports.

Witnesses who spoke to RFA’’s Tibetan service reported seeing two bodies in the central Barkor area of Lhasa, while unconfirmed reports set the death toll higher.

“There was shooting and death,” another Tibetan source told RFA’’s Mandarin service, adding, “”It’s not convenient to speak on the phone”.”

“Now the local Tibetans are protesting in the Barkor area,” a third Tibetan source said, referring to a central area in Lhasa. “They ransacked Chinese shops and the police fired live ammunition into the crowd. No one is allowed to move around in Lhasa now.”

China: UPDATED-Hu Jia indicted for subversion

UPDATE: from RFA’s Mandarin service [独家报道：律师拿到对胡佳“涉嫌煽动颠覆国家政权罪”起诉书]

HONG KONG—Authorities in Beijing have formally charged AIDS activist Hu Jia with “incitement to subversion” after he wrote articles online critical of China’s hosting of the Olympics, his lawyers said.

Baby Under House Arrest: Hu Qianci at four months. Courtesy of Zeng Jinyan’s blog.

China: Petitioner belief prompts pre-Olympic rush on capital

There is a saying among petitioners that if your problem cannot be solved before the Olympics, it will be even harder after the Games.

– Petitioner Liu Feiyue

The strength of this belief reminds me of the mythologies and stories told by other groups in a state of severe disempowerment, like street children. These stories are used like maps in a hostile terrain in which recognisable, ‘normal’ human meaning systems  (eg: children will be cared for; the judicial system will mostly apply the law) have completely broken down. I suppose I think this because from where I’m sitting, petitioners look equally unlikely to get what they are looking for on either side of the Olympics. The following is a digest of recent reporting on petitioners and blogger activists by RFA’s Mandarin service, translated by Chen Ping: