Twenty artists demonstrate in downtown Beijing
- Source: Global Times
- [13:06 February 24 2010]
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Six artists from Zhengyang and three from the neighboring 008 Art District were among those allegedly beaten.
One of the injured, Iwama Satoshi, a Japanese artist who was on guard Monday, was sent to China-Japan Friendship Hospital and received five stitches on the back of his head.
Police were notified by an artist who said he had managed to sneak out of the district. Three of the alleged assailants were caught by the artists and handed over to police.
"The officials said that they will help restore our gates and dispatch security guards to protect us until we reach an agreement with the developer," Gao said.
A notice handed out to some artists in late November says, "According to the government order, the community will be demolished on December 5, 2009. All tenants must move by the prescribed time. Otherwise articles in the house will be deemed as rejected. The demolition agency has the right to dispose of them at their discretion."
On December 3, a new notice with an official stamp of the Hanshiyizhou Culture and Art Development Company was put up to ask the artists to vacate the area by December 5.
But Gao said that some of the artists had signed new leases as recently as October.
When the artists didn't move, power and water supplies to their studios were cut off.
An official from Changdian village in Chaoyang District said Monday on condition of anonymity that the art centers are being demolished due to urban-rural integration in the district.
He refused to disclose details about whether there was a plan to resettle the thousands of artists currently living and working in the art centers, but he said the artists should ask their landlords for compensation.
About 40 percent of petitions in Beijing are related to demolitions, and 40 percent of mass incidents across the country are related to demolitions, according to Wang Cailiang, a specialist in demolition regulations in Beijing who said the current policies are flawed.
Last month, the draft of new demolition regulations was made available for public comment.
The draft stipulates that property-requisition agencies must compensate the property owners before they enforce demolition, and reconstruction can be granted only when 90 percent of property owners approve a project.
The draft also prohibits cutting off power, water or gas supplies to drive people out.
So far, the notice has received more than 20,000 public comments.
"The new rules have made obvious progress in protecting the rights of property owners and tenants. Hopefully, it can reduce conflicts arising from housing relocations," Wang said.
Xuyang Jingjing and Guo Qiang contributed to this story
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