Chinese villagers protest student death

More than a thousand villagers in southwest China carried the body of a student to a police station and fought with officers they claimed had protected a man accused in the death, a human rights group said Monday.

The riot in Jiulong centered around the death of 15-year-old Wang Qiang, who was killed May 13, the Hong Kong-based Information Center for Human Rights and Democracy said in a faxed statement.

The Jiulong police chief is the uncle of one of the suspects and residents and students in the Sichuan province town were angered because he had not been detained, the group said.

The deputy principle of Jiulong Township High School, a man surnamed Lu, on Monday confirmed Wang's death and said the two suspects had been arrested over the killing. It was not clear if the police chief's nephew was among those arrested.

It was not immediately clear how Wang died or why news of the riot had not been released earlier. But the group said the local government had temporarily cut off phone and Internet service to keep information from leaking out.

Ten protesters were injured in the May 17 clash, including one person who sustained a broken arm, when more than 1,000 residents and students clashed with police after marching to the station carrying Wang's body, the group said.

More than 30 people have been arrested, and Jiulong's police chief and five other officials have been suspended, the group said.

Phones at the Jiulong township government were busy Monday, and no one answered at the Jiulong Public Security Bureau.

The protest is the latest in a growing number of violent incidents across China in recent years as ordinary Chinese vent anger over official corruption, a growing rich-poor gap and land confiscations.