In Separate Chinese Riot, Residents Allege Torture

HUAXI, China -- In the weeks following a large-scale riot here on April 10, about 50 people were detained for questioning and a notice was posted saying anyone willing to inform on the leaders of the uprising would receive a handsome reward.

Before long, villagers and their attorneys said, the number of those jailed was whittled to 18, who were held for long-term questioning. Of those, nine were formally arrested and charged. One of the nine became a police informant and the other eight were put on trial for assaulting police or disrupting public order. A verdict is expected soon.

The violence began when about 3,000 policemen descended on the town 775 miles south of Beijing with orders to dismantle tents set up by protesters to block a nearby industrial park. The police were soon outnumbered by 20,000 peasants who beat and chased them out of town.

Authorities have shut down most of the chemical factories whose pollution gave rise to the rebellion, villagers said. And news reached them Tuesday that the mayor and the municipal and county Communist Party secretaries have been removed from office because of their decisions during the conflict. But the price of these victories was high for the eight villagers who were arrested and tried.

According to some of those released and attorneys for those on trial, police obtained incriminating information to bolster their charges by suspending suspects in uncomfortable positions, slamming them against walls and cuffing their twisted limbs to furniture or cell bars.

"Eight of the nine defendants said in court they were tortured," said Wei Rujiu, one of six Beijing attorneys representing defendants of the Huaxi uprising. "They were hung by their hands, forced to kneel down for long periods and were deprived of food. Some were beaten by other prisoners."

Manfred Nowak, the U.N. special envoy on torture, said this month after visiting nine Chinese prisons that police use of torture remains widespread despite reductions in urban areas. For the people of Huaxi, his finding was not news.

A 62-year-old Huaxi blacksmith said he was arrested May 19 and was repeatedly asked who beat policemen during the rioting. One of his arms was handcuffed to the bars of an iron cage and the other stretched uncomfortably to a wooden table leg, he said, as police questioned him from midnight until 5 a.m.

The blacksmith spoke on condition of anonymity, citing fear of retribution by police. He said he kept repeating he had no information because he was tending to trees in his pear orchard during the violent clashes. After the questioning, police allowed him to sit on the table with one arm still handcuffed to the leg, he said, until they released him that evening with a warning to tell no one about his interrogation.

Wang Liangping, 40, one of the eight defendants awaiting a verdict, told his sister, Wang Xiaofang, 42, that he was suspended by his arms from a bar and banged against a wall during a long interrogation. Pressed to acknowledge that he had beat a policeman, he told her, he eventually nodded as a way to stop the beating.