Hundreds of demonstrators and police have clashed in Shanghai as protests over China’s severe COVID-19 restrictions continued into the third day and spread to several other cities, Al Jazeera reported.
Protests against China’s ambitious zero Covid policy saw outrage in several cities including the epicentre of the virus, Wuhan.
Videos on social media showed hundreds of residents in Wuhan taking to the streets demanding an end to lockdowns.
The demonstrations began after 10 people were killed in a fire in Urumqi, the capital of the far-western region of Xinjiang, which many of the protesters blame on protracted COVID-19 lockdowns. The city’s four million residents were not allowed to leave their houses for as many as 100 days.
Officials have denied the COVID-19 lockdown measures had hampered escape and rescue efforts during the fire.
China’s case numbers have reached record highs for days, with more than 40,000 new cases reported by the authorities every day in the past week.
Hundreds of people gathered on Sunday evening in Shanghai, holding up blank sheets of paper as an expression of the censorship of protest.
An accredited BBC reporter covering the protests was assaulted and detained for several hours, the United Kingdom’s public broadcaster said.
