The protest started at 10:00 a.m. and lasted until about 2:00 p.m. During the protest, many other petitioners also showed their support on the street. The regime sent hundreds of police to drive away observers and arrest petitioners on top of the building.
A witness told The Epoch Times that both groups of petitioners shouted slogans together, it was quite grand with a thousand people there watching.
The abandoned building is located on a busy street in Beijing. It is located on Zhushi Road, near Qianmen Street.
Mr. Zhou, a petitioner from southwest China’s Chongqing City, told The Epoch Times there were about a dozen petitioners from central China’s Shanxi province on top of the building, and over 300 petitioners supporting them on the street. “They shouted slogans loudly, ‘Knock down corruption! Knock down corrupted officials! Give us back our human rights! Long live democracy!’ and so on,” said Zhou, adding that more than 800 people gathered there to watch, reaching to around 1,000 at the peak.
At about 11:30 a.m., Beijing police took action. They arrested more than 40 petitioners. Mr. Zhou said some petitioners were tied up with ropes by the police. Two were seriously injured, and carried down from upstairs and sent to hospital by ambulance for emergency rescue.
Petitioner Xue Jianhui, who protested on top of the building, wrote a “Letter of Despair” before setting out, “In this sunny May, we’re despairing. The country has reached such a moment: prices soaring, profiteers everywhere, power politics, bureaucratic corruption ... At this moment for the life or death of the petitioners, my fellow countrymen, all fellow countrymen with conscience, please listen to our voices!”
Mr. Zhou said that some of the petitioners’ lands were embezzled, property was robbed, and some suffered miscarriage of justice. They defended their rights at the cost of their lives to protest the central regime’s irresponsibility for allowing local officials’ corruption.
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