During and after the May Day holiday in China, security checks in Beijing have been further escalated. According to visiting residents, this year’s security checks are stricter than in previous years. In just one day, they experienced three humiliating body searches, criticizing the authorities for using security checks as a means of suppressing visiting groups.
Before May Day, dozens of visiting residents from Shanghai traveled to Beijing to appeal their grievances, but they were intercepted and collectively sent back to Shanghai. Among them, Liu Dongbao was detained for seven days and released on May 1.
Accompanying Liu Dongbao, Gu Guoping told Epoch Times that the visiting residents were successively taken to police cars, transfer centers (public security management brigades), and Jiu Jingzhuang, undergoing three illegal body searches in a row.
Gu Guoping mentioned that he suffers from severe illnesses such as stage three hypertension, diabetes complications, with blood pressure reaching 200 mmHg, and a risk of stroke at any time. He said it was even more inhumane that the police confiscated the emergency medicine he carried with him and did not return it. “It’s outrageous. They took everything out, confiscated it, and never returned it to you. They took away your medicine and wouldn’t let you take it.”
Gu Guoping stated that he and visiting residents had traveled to Beijing numerous times before, encountering security checks and illegal detentions, but this year was especially severe. The current situation intentionally creates a very frightening and tense atmosphere, unlike security checks even at airport entries. “They search you thoroughly from top to bottom, inside out, strip you down to just your underwear, even for women, which was not the case before.”
Such body searches are conducted three times in total: first when being taken to the police car, second at the transfer center, and third at Jiu Jingzhuang.
Gu Guoping believes this is an insult to human dignity. “Insulting our dignity under the guise of security checks, treating us like prisoners, like terrorists, seriously infringes on human rights, leaving us without an ounce of dignity, insulting us this way.”
For decades, Gu Guoping and numerous visiting residents have experienced interception, repression, and being sent to black prisons. The laws formulated by the Chinese Communist Party are not meant to protect the people but to uphold the vested interests of the ruling class. “They’ve stripped us of all our rights. Their fear of us is for their own special interests. By depriving us of the benefits we deserve, it’s a redistribution of power.”
Visiting resident Chen Qing (pseudonym), who has visited Beijing multiple times, expressed that in the past, there was hope for the petitioning system. They followed the government’s instructions, submitted materials to various petition offices at all levels, but ultimately did not see any results. After more than a decade of rights defense efforts, he finally sees the true nature of the Chinese Communist Party. “I see clearly now what the CCP is really like. It’s not here to serve the people, not to solve problems, just to block your path. Even your life, your freedom, in its eyes, are worthless.”