Embassies warn of ‘possible threats’
Print Edition
AT least four Western countries took the unusual step of issuing Christmas security warnings for Westerners in a popular Beijing diplomatic and entertainment district yesterday as police stepped up patrols.
The US Embassy said in a brief statement it had “received information of possible threats” against Westerners in Sanlitun, also home to many embassies, on or around today’s Christmas Day.
The US Embassy’s statement on its website urged citizens to be vigilant, while the British Embassy made a similar warning, saying it had also received information about possible threats against Westerners on or around the Christmas period.
The French Embassy passed on the US warning to its citizens. Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs issued a similar warning.
Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Hong Lei said he was aware of the reports and that the government paid great attention to foreigners’ safety.
Beijing police, in an online statement, said they had issued a “yellow” security alert for Christmas and New Year.
“Beijing police are planning ahead and taking many measures to ensure good public order,” it said.
A yellow alert is the second mildest under a four-coded alert system, which goes from green, yellow, orange to red in order of severity. It means 60 percent of the security personnel in shopping malls and supermarkets should carry out security checks on suspected personnel, materials and vehicles, according to a government security prevention regulation.
In October, police in the Chinese capital issued a yellow alert during the National Day holiday period.
The fashionable Sanlitun bar and restaurant area occasionally sees fights. In August a lone attacker stabbed a French man and his wife there. The woman, a Chinese, died.
However, Beijing is generally regarded as safe and criminals rarely target foreigners.
In October 2013, five people were killed and dozens injured when a vehicle ploughed into crowds in Tian’anmen Square in a terrorist attack staged by militants from northwest China’s Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region.
Christmas is not a holiday in China, but more and more young people celebrate it as they view it as a sophisticated Western custom and excuse to give gifts.
The number of people visiting shopping, entertainment and dining venues will increase remarkably, according to a police statement on microblog Sina Weibo.
Police will spare no efforts to ensure security and order, it said. Around Sanlitun, three police vehicles from a specialist unit tasked with counter-terrorism, riot control, and other tasks such as anti-hijacking and bomb disposal, were deployed to the area with armed officers yesterday afternoon, according to the Legal Evening News.
Photos on social media showed a heightened police presence in front of a Sanlitun shopping center home to major international brands.
They also showed a camouflage van surrounded by men armed with rifles wearing fatigues in a plaza near one of Beijing’s two embassy districts.
Traffic restrictions were implemented from 4pm along the Sanlitun bar street area, the newspaper said, adding that dustbins in Taiguli, a shopping area within Sanlitun, had been removed.
It also said that the education authority in Haidian District had asked schools in the district not to take students to crowded places, such as Sanlitun, during Christmas time and the New Year.
In other districts, police said they would strengthen their presence around churches and increase surveillance in commercial hubs to prevent stampedes.
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