China Criticized Over Sterilization Bid to Enforce Pro-Abortion One-Child Rule

From http://lifenews.com/int1516.html

China Criticized Over Sterilization Bid to Enforce Pro-Abortion One-Child Rule

by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
April 20, 2010

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Beijing, China (LifeNews.com) -- Chinese officials have come under fire over the last week for a massive campaign to attempt to sterilize as many as 10,000 people for violating the nation's one child rule. The family planning rule has seen the nation subject people to forced abortions and other human rights abuses.

Officials in southern China launched a bid to sterilize people living in and around Puning, a city of 2.2 million people in the southern province of Guangdong.

AFP indicated as many as 1,300 people were detained in the first portion of the campaign that national leaders are reportedly denying.

The focus began with people who refused to submit to voluntary sterilization and their relatives. They were reportedly held in governmental buildings and given lectures on why the need to abide by the one child policy.

"It's not uncommon for family planning authorities to adopt some tough tactics," one employee told the English-language Global Times newspaper.

The newspaper noted thousands of Chinese people in the area have already agreed to become sterilized, potentially fearing the governmental reprisals that await them for refusing.

Huang Ruifeng, a father of three, told the newspaper family planning officials contacted him and when he said he was too busy to comply with the request to go to the government office, officials apprehended his father.

Zhang Lizhao, 38, the father of two sons, told the London Times, “This morning my wife called me and said they were forcing her to be sterilized today. She pleaded with the clinic to wait because she has her period. But they would not wait a single day. I called and begged them but they said no. So I have rushed back. I am satisfied because I have two sons.”

The campaign is coming because Guangdong is facing the possibility of being rated by the national government as a second-tier county and faces the loss of services and support if it doesn't meet national family planning requirements.

The Times indicates officials have said they have already met more than half their goal.