Forced evictions as China eyes Olympics

HONG KONG - China continues to forcibly evict people to make way for new buildings despite fears among its leaders that it could spark unrest, with 400,000 moved from Beijing Olympic venue sites, a rights group said yesterday.

Handing China, Zimbabwe and the Indian state of Maharashtra its annual "housing rights violator awards", the Geneva-based Centre on Housing Rights and Evictions (COHRE) said the Chinese government was sacrificing residents' rights for economic growth.

"We receive daily reports of evictions in rural areas and urban centres, with Beijing and Shanghai leading the way," COHRE executive director Scott Leckie said.

With an estimated 15 million people flooding in from the countryside every year, new apartment blocks, shopping centres and roads are sprouting in every major Chinese city. And Beijing is spending around US$40 billion ($57.4 billion) to prepare for the 2008 Olympics.

Chinese authorities have demolished at least 1.25 million homes, evicting 3.7 million people in the last decade, the group said.

"The Beijing government has admitted a minimum of 400,000 people have been moved to create space to build various Olympic venues, and the IOC have said nothing," Mr Leckie said, referring to the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

"Many were forcibly evicted and not provided with a proper relocation compensation settlement."

China's building boom has drawn outside developers such as Singapore's CapitaLand Ltd. and Keppel Land Ltd, Hong Kong's Hang Lung Properties and now US mall firms Taubman Centers Inc. and Simon Property Group Inc.

With protests over evictions rising, nervous local authorities want developers to pay more to resettle families, some firms say.

Shui-On Land, which is building on a huge strip of land in central Shanghai and recently began a city centre project in southwest Chongqing, says the going rate is about 300,000 yuan ($53,000).

But early this year a Shanghai shopkeeper was refusing to move from a site for less than 4 million yuan.

Analysts say a move by China in early 2005 to enshrine the right to own property in its constitution, turning its back on decades of ideology, was a sign of changing attitudes.

"Possession is nine tenths of the law -- it's an old adage, but it's becoming more relevant in China now," said David Pitchon, executive director of property consultants CB Richard Ellis in Shanghai.

"In downtown Shanghai, forced eviction for luxury apartments is tough to achieve because the press ends up giving the government a hard time," he said. "If it's for public works though, it's not so much of an issue."

Mr Leckie urged foreign developers in China to be aware of an erosion of "social and economic rights".

"Compensation is only one part of the package, there's also the ability to freely resist eviction," he said. "Doing that today puts you under tremendous risk. There are many reports of those who have suffered greatly."

COHRE also cited Zimbabwe for "persistent" violation of the housing rights of its people, saying 190,000 homes had been demolished or burnt in poor areas since May in the government's Operation Murambatsvina, or "drive out the rubbish".

The Indian state of Maharashtra had forcibly evicted 350,000 people in Mumbai since December 2004, COHRE said, in a bid to transform the city into a "world-class metropolis".

Last year, the rights group named Sudan, Russia and the United States as recipients of its "violator" awards.

- REUTERS