COVID protesters and riot police clash in China's fifth biggest city
Riot police clad in white hazmat suits clashed with protestors in the Chinese manufacturing hub of Guangzhou on Tuesday night.
Anger in China's fifth-biggest city towards strict COVID lockdowns bubbled over into violent frays with police last night, marking an escalation in unrest breaking out this weekend.
Following protests in Shanghai, Beijing and elsewhere, the clashes come as China posts record numbers of daily COVID cases, while slightly loosening restrictions in the southern region around Guangzhou by health officials.
In one video posted on Twitter, dozens of riot police in all-white pandemic gear, holding shields over their heads, advanced in formation over what appeared to be torn-down lockdown barriers as objects fly at them.
Police were later seen escorting a row of people in handcuffs to an unknown location.
China's largest wave of civil disobedience since the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests comes amid a slowdown of the country's economy, which has grown at a breakneck speed for decades.
This era of prosperity, which saw hundreds of millions lifted from poverty, was integral to the social contract between the ruling Communist Party and the wider population.
Some of the protestors over the weekend voiced rare criticism of President Xi Jinping, calling on him to resign.
Taking power 10 years ago, Xi has presided over a significant crackdown on freedoms, the mass imprisonment of China's Uyghur Muslim population and undermined the quasi-independence of Hong Kong.
Protests were sparked on Saturday following the deaths of at least 10 people in an apartment fire last week in Urumqi in the Xinjiang region in the northwest. People have complained that COVID restrictions hindered rescue efforts, though the authorities
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