Slave China Update.

AFP: Mass land grabs in China fuel unrest
TUANFAN VILLAGE, China (AFP) - Liang Fengying has farmed this land in her Chinese village for the past four decades -- but she is about to work her last harvest here.

Reuters: China to 'strike hard' against rising unrest
China is preparing to "strike hard" against rising public unrest, a senior police official said according to state media on Thursday, highlighting the government's fears for stability even as the economy booms.



International Herald Tribune: Letter from China: China builds a new wall, and democracy hits it

The other day, an acquaintance pointed out something I'd scarcely noticed on a frequently traveled route through this city: steel benches had been removed from the sidewalk in front of one of central Shanghai's premier hotels.

It seemed like idle chatter at first. Then came the payoff in the form of a hard-bitten observation by a Chinese person who knew his own society.
"The city government must be getting ready for an important meeting across the street. If they are so afraid, they shouldn't hold their meetings in the heart of the business district."

For months now, the site in question, on Nanjing Lu, directly across the street from the majestic, Soviet-designed Shanghai Exhibition Center, where the city's leaders often meet, has been gradually transformed into a sort of Democracy Wall. This is the place where Shanghai residents come these days to air their grievances, usually over property issues, like being railroaded out of the central city as a result of cozy deals between local officials and big developers. And sure enough, a few days after the friend's comment, a big meeting of city leaders was convened there.

Over time, the site has become an ever-bigger headache for the police, whose job seems to be keeping the discontented out of the view of the city's leaders, as well as the investors, celebrities, well-heeled tourists and big shots of every stripe who flock to the hotel, drawn by the inescapable hype about Shanghai, the world's latest gleaming global city on the hill.