Chinese government steps up repression of worker militants

Scan page 13

Wang Guiyuan, an unemployed worker, and Zhou Xiang Cheng, a shopkeeper, being prepared for their execution last year.

SOCIALIST ACTION MAY 1991 13 The following article is reprinted from the March 1991 issue of October Review, a monthly magazine published in Hong Kong.

Immediately after the Chinese New Year in mid-February, the Chinese government announced that all trials related to the June 4, [1989 Tiananmen Square massacre] "incident" were finished.

And yet, on March 5 and 8 [1991] Beijing's courts have conducted trials of Chen Yanlin, Zhang Yafei and Han Binglin on the charges of counter-revolutionary acts. All three of them are workers, and were active in organizing workers during the democracy movement [19189.

On March 18, 1991, friends of Zhang Yafei said that he was sentenced to seven years on charges of leading a counterrevolutionary organization and publishing an anti-Communist publication after June 4 until his arrest in September 1990.

Meanwhile, the main leaders of the Beijing Workers Autonomous Federation (BWAF), such as Han Dongfang, Liu Qiang, Lin Jinjin and He Lili, have still not been put on trial.

Earlier, in February, the regime refused to make public the sentence of Liu Zhihou, a worker. However, a court notice in Beijing on March 18 announced the sentencing to death of Han Wijun, aged 24, for the "serious crime" of "setting fire to a car and armoured personnel carrier on June 4, 1989." He is the first to be sentenced to death since the initial wave of executions immediately after June 4, 1989.

Thus, this execution could represent a new aspect in the policy of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to present a moderate image to the outside world. It is also increasingly clear that the workers are the main target of this renewed wave of repres sion.

Bureaucracy fears workers

Why is the regime striking so hard against the workers? While it denounces some intellectuals as "black hands" behind the student movement, it tries to dissociate the worker activists in the democracy movement from the student movement by denouncing them for hooliganism and other ridiculous charges. What does this reflect?

During the Democracy Movement '89, after more than a month of preparation and organization, the BWAF officially declared its foundation on May 20, [1989], and published its provisional statutes on May 30. A few hours after that, three leaders of the BWAF were arrested, well before the arrest of any students or intellectuals. On June 3, just prior to the massacre, the BWAF issued a call for a general strike on June 4.

While the massacre might not have been a direct reaction to the actions of the BWAF, it is quite clear that, since mid-May, the regime and the BWAF have been in a tense race for time. While the BWAF had not yet evolved to the position of seeing the regime as unreformable, the regime saw the BWAF as its grave digger, and the destruction of the B WAF as a necessary and urgent task to save itself.

Ever since the June 4 crackdown, the discontent of the Chinese working class towards the the ruling bureaucracy has kept growing. While the regime has tried to pacify the workers by allowing more wage raises in general, more and more workers have been affected by production stoppages and unemployment, as well as other probof bureaucrats and in the media.

For example, a news dispatch by the China News Agency on December 10, 1990, reported the president of the official All China Federation of Trade Unions (ACFTU) saying in an Executive Committee meeting that "all levels of the trade unions must work hard with a great sense of political responsibility to assist the government [to] solve properly the problems of production stoppages and waiting-for-employment [unemployment), as well as other problems affecting the mood and livelihood of workers."

Worker discontent grows

As reported in a news dispatch by AFP [Agence France-Presse] on January 25, 1991, the Workers Daily acknowledged that the confidence of the workers in the Chinese leadership has fallen to a dangerous level and appealed for immediate action to prevent turmoil and unrest from appearing in the society.

[The Workers Daily also acknowledged] that workers hate the negative phenomena of corruption in the Party and society, as we!! as many other factors leading to discontent; [for example], the low social status (of workers); 100 [many] rich private business merchants; poor public facilities, housing and benefits, price rises and the sluggish economy; and so on.

There[in] lies the significance of the continued and intensified repression by the regime on workers: a reflection of the CCP's consciousness of its crisis among workers.

Today, there is an international petition campaign mounted by the Tiananmen University of Democracy among non-govemmental organizations and the broad public against the repression of democracy activists by the Chinese regime.

In addition, among other campaigns, a petition campaign [has been] mounted by the Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions ((HKCTU) among trade unions and labour groups in Hong Kong specifically for the release by the Chinese government of all arrested democracy movement worker activists, in particular the members and leaders of the BWAF.

The statement printed below is from the HKCTU on the Beijing Workers Autonomous Federation. The HKCTU is also calling for a campaign for the release of one of the best-known independent union leader[s], Han Dongfang.