- Title: CHINA: Beijing beefs up security as Oslo prepares for Nobel Prize ceremony
- Date: 11th December 2010
- Summary: TELEVISION SCREEN SHOWING BBC WORLD NEWS' ANNOUNCER WITH PICTURE CUT TO BLACK BLACK SCREEN WITH BBC WORLD NEWS ANNOUNCER BACK ON SCREEN
- Embargoed: 26th December 2010 12:00
- Keywords:
- Location: China, China
- Country: China
- Topics: International Relations
- Reuters ID: LVA6VAQ5VJEADLNL98D7TVV4T0MR
- Story Text: Security was heightened in central Beijing on Friday (December 10) morning before the Nobel Peace Prize was due to be awarded to jailed Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo (pron: liew seeaow-bwoh) in Norway.
Police vehicles surrounded Tiananmen Square and were parked in front of the Gate of Heavenly Peace, where guards checked citizens entering the area below the portrait of former Chairman Mao Zedong (peon: maow zer-dong).
Armed SWAT police stood at regular intervals along Chang'an Avenue, the capital's main road.
Authorities have conducted a crackdown against activists in the run-up to the Oslo gala and have prevented Liu's friends and family from attending.
The Nobel committee has decided to represent the Peace Prize laureate with an empty chair during the ceremony, in what it said was a symbol of the Chinese policy to isolate and repress dissidents.
It will be the first time that a laureate under detention has not been formally represented since Nazi Germany barred pacifist Carl von Ossietzky from attending in 1935.
Liu's wife Liu Xia (pron: liew seeah) has not been seen since the award was given to her husband in early October, and is believed to be under house arrest in her flat.
Police and unidentified men stood guard in front of the main gate of her compound and prevented journalists from filming.
Infuriated by the Nobel Committee's award to a man it labels as subversive and a criminal, Beijing has stepped up its rhetoric.
The English language China Daily newspaper carried a front page article with the headline "'Most nations' oppose peace prize to Liu".
But the media has mainly avoided mentioning Liu, and on the streets of Beijing, the majority of people have no idea who he was.
"Huh?" said one woman when a journalist mentioned his name. "I have never heard of him."
"I don't know what he does. I don't know much about it, I really don't know what he does. But I feel like I've seen him in the newspapers," said noodle seller Liu Jinhua (pron: liew jin-hwah) In reaction to the prize, Beijing has let the row with the Nobel Committee spill over into wider diplomacy, publicly criticising the West for trying to force its ideas onto China.
Beijing resident Mr Liu (pron: liew) says human rights in China had improved immensely in the last three decades since China opened up to the outside world:
"Isn't China's human rights issue improving? China's population is too big, and it's not like your countries that have been developing for hundreds of years. So your systems are already mature. China still needs to improve."
China had also tightened security around the Norwegian Embassy, with vigilant guards trying to prevent journalists from filming.
The country's media censors are on the alert with foreign news broadcast signals being cut at the mention of the Liu and his prize.
Beijing has used its economic influence in pressuring diplomats to boycott the ceremony, saying the "vast majority" of nations would do so.
The Norwegian award committee says two-thirds of those invited would attend.
China views criticism of its human rights record as a bid to contain its growing might and it has repeatedly said any changes to its political system should not emulate Western democracies.
However, critics said that Chinese leaders still fear broad-based opposition such as that seen in the 1989 Tiananmen protests, in which Liu Xiaobo played a part, and pointed out that they still have to tackle hundreds of cases of social unrest daily in the world's most populous country.
"I think that governments around the world design their foreign policy on the basis of who is in power, not who is in prison. Nonetheless, the Communist Party is really fragile in terms of image at home and abroad. This picture of unmitigated success in a harmonious society really does not withstand scrutiny," said Nicholas Bequelin, Senior Asia Researcher for Human Rights Watch.
China jailed Liu last Christmas Day for 11 years for "subversion of state power" after he co-authored Charter 08, a manifesto calling for democratic reform in the one-party state.
In the days ahead of the prize, many of Liu's supporters and high profile dissidents have been put under house arrest, harrassed or hustled out of Beijing.
Zhang Xianling (jang sien-ling), co-founder of "Tiananmen Mothers", a group which aims to compile a list of those killed in Tiananmen Square in 1989, said she had agreed to leave Beijing after several days of being under 24-hour watch by security forces.
Despite the disruption to her life, she still supports Liu Xiaobo and his cause.
"In the time of Nazi Germany a Nobel prize winner could not collect the award and now this has happened in China. China is a monopoly dictatorship society and now China resembles Nazi times. Liu Xiaobo is in jail and his wife cannot go - this seems ironic for China because China says it is a democratic country, a so-called 'socialist democratic' country. It is a slap on the face for China, they are boycotting the award and they do not want to correct the mistake of sending Liu Xiaobo to jail for his speech. China is queuing up to join the fascist line," said Zhang in a phone interview from China's southern Yunnan (pron: yoon-nan) province.
Zhang, whose son died in the Tiananmen protests, has her own personal reason to support Liu.
According to his wife, he has dedicated the prize to those who died in the bloody 1989 crackdown on pro-democracy protesters around Tiananmen Square.
China has little patience with critics of its political system. The heavy security and crackdown on dissent may only serve to prove that even though he is in jail, the former literature professor is still a painful thorn in the Chinese government's side. - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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