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A building lies destroyed in Liucheng county in Guangxi after a series of parcel bomb explosions. Photo: Kyodo
The suspect in a series of deadly parcel bomb attacks in Guangxi has been confirmed dead in one of Wednesday's explosions, Xinhua reported on Friday, citing Liuzhou city police.
Police said Wei Yinyong, 33, made a number of time bombs, delivering them himself or sending them via couriers in Liucheng county.
The authorities also revised up the death toll from the blasts from seven to 10, with another 51 injured.
Police said Wei launched the attacks in anger over conflicts with villagers who lived near his quarry and some government departments.The damaged Liuzhou City Government Office. Photo: Dickson Lee
A badly damaged building in Liucheng county following Wednesday's series of bomb blasts, which killed seven people. Photo: SCMP Pictures
A new explosion rocked Liucheng county in China’s southwestern Guangxi province on Thursday morning – the day after a series of bombs hidden in parcels exploded and killed at least seven people and injured dozens more.
This screen grab from Weibo shows what appears to be a person catapulted out of a store during one of the explosions on Wednesday in China’s Guangxi province. Photo: SCMP Pictures
Police have launched an investigation and ruled out any terrorist link to the attacks. They have also identified a male suspect in the matter.
Here we take a look at just six of the many incidents in China in which people have resorted to violence because of social grievances, including disputes over local government compulsory land purchases and failed compensation claims.
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1. Nine deadly bombs set off as 'revenge'
Taiyuan, November 2013
Chinese state television showed police escorting Feng Zhijun after his detention in November 2013. Photo: SCMP Pictures
At least one person died and eight others were injured when nine homemade bombs exploded near the Shanxi Communist Party’s offices during the morning rush hour in the centre of Taiyuan city.
Pandemonium broke out as panicked crowds struggled to escape from the area.
Metal ball bearings and bomb circuit detonators were found lying on the ground close to the site of the explosions, state-run Xinhua news agency said.
Feng Zhijun, a former convict from Taiyuan, who had served nine years in prison for a 1989 theft, was later arrested.
He confessed to police that he had wanted to “take revenge against society”.
At his trial the court was told he had set off the bombs after failing to halt local government plans to demolish his home.
In April 2014 Feng was convicted of setting off the explosions and sentenced to death.
2. School bombed after migrant's child rejected
Guilin, September 2013
Damaged motorbikes and debris lie on the ground after the explosion outside a primary school in Guilin, in China's Guangxi province in September 2013. Photo: AFP
An unnamed migrant worker in his 30s killed himself and another person after detonating a bomb as he rode a motorcycle past a primary school in Guilin.
The blast also injured 44 other people, including 22 children from the school.
Earlier the school had refused to accept the man’s child as a pupil.
The shortage of educational opportunities in cities for the children of migrant workers has long been a problem and a source of resentment on the mainland.
3. Man sets of airport bomb ‘by accident’
Beijing, July 2013
Ji Zhongxing is taken to hospital after being injured by a bomb he was holding during a protest at Beijing Capital International Airport in September 2013. Photo: Xinhua
A disgruntled wheelchair-bound migrant worker, Ji Zhongxing, set off a home-made bomb near the international arrivals gate at Beijing Capital International Airport in 2013.
The blast blew off Ji’s left hand and also injured a police officer.
At his trial, Ji claimed he had detonated the bomb unintentionally while holding it in his hand, while protesting about police brutality, which he claimed had left him paralysed.
He also said he had “lost all hope with society”. Ji was jailed for six years.
4. Protester kills 46 commuters in bus fire
Xiamen, June 2013
A firemen examines the burned out bus in which 47 people travelling during the evening rush hour died in Xiamen in June 2013. Photo: Xinhua
Chen Shuizong, 59, killed himself and 46 others, and injured a further 34 people after setting fire to a crowded bus during the evening rush hour in Xiamen in 2013.
He had already posted messages online complaining about being unable to receive any social security insurance payments because of a clerical error by police when recording his age.
He claimed they had also refused to take his complaints seriously.
Authorities confirmed that he had started the blaze and also left behind a suicide note.
5. Disabled bomber dies during grievance talks
Shandong province, September 2012
A wheelchair-bound suicide bomber killed himself and injured six other people after setting off a bomb while meeting local government officials in Rongcheng, in Shandong province, to discuss his grievances.
Qu Huaqiang, 49, a former construction worker, had spent years demanding for extra compensation after being left paralysed by a work-related spinal injury following a crane accident in 1992.
He had claimed that his complaints had fallen on deaf ears.
6. Dead man tricked into carrying bomb
Yunnan province, May 2012
A booklet belonging to Zhao Dengyong, who died after being duped into carrying a bomb inside rucksack which went off when he walked into a community centre in Yunnan province. Photo: Simon Song
Police accused Zhao Dengyong of being an extremist and a suicide bomber after he was killed when a bomb he unwittingly carried into a crowded community centre detonated in Qiaojia county in 2012.
The blast also killed three others and injured another 16 people.
However, police were forced to reinvestigate the blast after protests by Zhao’s relatives and friends.
Three months later the truth emerged, and they had to apologise for their “careless and inaccurate findings”.
They had discovered that two villagers with grievances about local government plans for compulsory land purchases had paid Zhao 100 yuan (HK$122) to carry a backpack into the centre, where residents were discussing relocation plans.
Suspect Wei Yinyong was reportedly frustrated by a dispute over a quarry in which he had a stake. Photo: SCMP Pictures
The sole suspect in a series of deadly parcel bomb attacks in Guangxi has been confirmed dead in one of Wednesday’s explosions, Xinhua reported on Friday, citing Liuzhou city police.
Police in Guangxi said the blasts were carried out by 33-year-old Wei Yinyong, and DNA tests had confirmed his remains were at one of the blast sites, the report said. No other suspects were named in the report.
The county of Liucheng was rocked by a series of blasts this week – 17 on Wednesday afternoon and one the next morning, which together claimed 10 lives and injured 51 people.
The explosions were all caused by time bombs Wei either delivered himself or sent by courier, the report said. The brief police statement said Wei was in dispute with villagers over a stone quarry he had a stake in.
Wei invested heavily on Zhihao Stone Quarry, before angry villagers smashed the machines and forced it to close. Photo: Dickson Lee
Wei’s brother and father told the South China Morning Post on Friday that Wei was frustrated when protesting villagers forced the closure of the quarry and the local authorities failed to negotiate a solution.
Wei had been the manager of the Zhihao Stone Quarry since it opened in 2003. The quarry was named after its founder Wei Zhihao, who became Wei’s father-in-law in 2009. The quarry had a major upgrade in 2010, with both men taking out bank loans to buy more than a million yuan’s worth of equipment, according to Wei’s brother, who would only identify himself as Luo.
Building stand in ruins at a blast site in Liucheng county, Guangxi. Photo: Xinhua
Angered by the frequent explosions at the quarry, more than 100 residents from the village of Zhaijiaotun, less than 1km from the site, marched to the quarry on October 28, 2013, and smashed the machines, forcing an immediate shutdown.
Luo said Wei became withdrawn in the second half of 2014 after repeated requests to local government departments to resolve the dispute ended without success.
“He knew there was no way the quarry could reopen but he just wanted a solution from the government,” Luo said.
His frustration was evident on a social media page which Luo confirmed was created by his brother.
“When it comes to a day when I become crazy, please remember I have been fooled like an idiot when I was pure and innocent,” the page’s main post said.
Villagers confirmed Luo’s account of the smashed equipment.
“His quarry was smashed for a reason,” one resident said, as government officials watched nearby. “Kids were scared of the sound of the explosions and windows were damaged by its shock waves.”
The quarry was built on the father-in-law’s land but the project should not have gone ahead without their approval, residents said.
Wei Yinyong had a stake in a quarry that was attacked by villagers upset by frequent explosions at the site. Photo: Dickson Lee
Wei Yinyong, father of a six-year-old daughter and a one-year-old son, was home for dinner on Tuesday, the day before the explosions, but said nothing special, according to his father. “He was a well-behaved kid and had no bad thoughts,” the father said.
Wei Yinyong’s father and brother were both taken away by police on Wednesday night but were released a day later. The brother was taken away again on Friday. Wei Yinyong’s wife and father-in-law were also in custody for questioning.
Wei Yinyong’s father and brother said they could not believe he planned the explosions.
“I don’t accept the accusations. There’s not enough evidence,” the brother said.
A partially collapsed residential building, which was damaged after a suspected parcel bomb exploded in Liucheng county, in Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region on Wednesday. Photo: Dickson Lee
A series of deadly bomb blasts in China this week has shown how easy it is to obtain explosives in the country – exposing a major gap in the mainland’s huge security apparatus as the economy slows and anger grows over issues such as corruption and poor public services.
In a country where firearms are banned for most people, the bombings in the southwestern city of Liuzhou, in the Guanxi autonomous region, on Wednesday and Thursday, and other places around the country in recent years, demonstrate lax enforcement of rules that control access to bomb-making materials.
Private gun ownership is also banned on the mainland, but many thousands of illegal weapons are traded on the black market.
The 18 coordinated blasts across Liuzhou, which lies in a relatively obscure part of China, destroyed one whole side of a low-rise residential building, overturned vehicles and sent bricks showering into the street, images carried by state media television and newspapers showed.
The force of one of Wednesday's blasts in Liucheng county, in Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region, overturned a truck
The explosions killed at least seven people and injured more than 50.
The attacks have been blamed on one individual in the city, but such “sudden incidents” – as Beijing refers to them – highlight broader government fears about stability in the world’s second-largest economy, with a widening gap between rich and poor and growing anger at corruption and environmental issues.
“Modern Chinese society has lots of contradictions, and if people want to send a message about their anger or make a point, they can get explosives from any mine,” said Pan Zhiping, a domestic security expert at the Xinjiang Academy of Social Sciences.
“It simply isn’t possible for the police to keep an eye on everybody,” he said.
The ease with which explosives can be obtained on the mainland was underscored in a court case posted online earlier this year as part of a government transparency drive.
In September last year, a court in southwestern China’s Yunnan province jailed a man for three years after finding more than 20kg of explosives, almost 100 detonators and 1.5km of fuses at his house.
The man, whose surname was given as Ren, told the court he had found it easy to buy the materials by claiming that they were needed for his job, according to the court ruling.
In fact, Ren said he had been buying the explosives and storing them at home for the past decade without any problems, even though he seemed to have no violent intent.
The government said it was not aware of any motive for this week’s attacks in Liuzhou in the southwestern region of Guangxi after ruling out terrorism.
The suspect in the bombings, a 33-year-old man identified only by his surname, Wei, had used other people to send the parcel bombs, according to Xinhua news agency.
“It indicates a serious problem in China in terms of public security,” said Jian Zhang, a lecturer in international and political studies at the University of New South Wales, in Australia.
It reflects a lack of effective control by the government to restrict access to these dangerous goods.”
Guangxi is home to many mines, which regularly use explosives, and like the rest of China, has numerous firework factories.
Last year, police in Liuzhou arrested a father and son who were “unhappy with society and wanted revenge” and blew up trash cans in a public square using home-made firecrackers, injuring a female bystander, state media reported.
Property disputes in a country where the government legally owns all land, including the compulsory purchase of properties and farmland, have also led to unruly protests, fights with police, imprisonment and even suicide, and created a major headache for the stability-obsessed ruling Communist Party.
In 2011, a man apparently angry about the illegal demolition of his home set off coordinated explosions at three sites near government buildings in eastern China, killing two people.
In the same month, a petrol bomb set off by a disgruntled former employee at a rural bank in a heavily Tibetan region of northwestern China’s Gansu province wounded 49 people.
The worst incident of its kind happened in 2001, when a string of explosions at workers’ dormitories in the northern city of Shijiazhuang killed 108 people.
The bombing was blamed on a man, who was reportedly seeking vengeance for family problems, although many people have doubted that explanation.
