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Police profiling and ID checks questioned
By People's Daily website |
March 22, 2012, Thursday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
"I was walking down the street. Suddenly two policemen walked towards me, demanding to see my ID card, and inserted it in a card reader. Scary indeed!" Thus blogged a resident in Guangzhou, Guangdong Province.
From March 16, police in Tianhe District had set up 54 stationary posts, eight mobile teams and 16 interception areas to examine residents' documents. People in other districts may encounter similar treatment. Those found without proper documents and who fail to give plausible explanations might end up in police custody.
From a legal point of view, the police do enjoy the right to see people's ID cards, under some conditions.
It is provided by law that "to safeguard social order, people's police from Public Security organizations, after showing their certificates and relevant documents, can interrogate on the scene people suspected of criminal offenses." The newly revised law regarding ID cards also stipulates that the police, while carrying out their official duties, can demand to see the ID cards in train stations, long-haul bus stations, ports, airports, and elsewhere.
But in such cases, there are qualifications regarding "people suspected of criminal offenses," or the locations.
When this practice is extended to any citizens anywhere, it might represent a grave contravention of a citizen's basic rights.
Guangzhou police explained that their decision whether to exercise their rights to interrogate would be based on their visual assessment of the people in question.
The "visual assessment" smells frankly of discrimination. Guangzhou lies in a subtropical area where a lot of elderly residents choose to saunter about in shorts and slippers, and nothing more.
Obviously, when the police decide who is suspicious on the basis of their appearance, somebody indifferently dressed would be more vulnerable to cross-examination, while those respectably attired swindlers or even fugitives could easily escape their detection.
From March 16, police in Tianhe District had set up 54 stationary posts, eight mobile teams and 16 interception areas to examine residents' documents. People in other districts may encounter similar treatment. Those found without proper documents and who fail to give plausible explanations might end up in police custody.
From a legal point of view, the police do enjoy the right to see people's ID cards, under some conditions.
It is provided by law that "to safeguard social order, people's police from Public Security organizations, after showing their certificates and relevant documents, can interrogate on the scene people suspected of criminal offenses." The newly revised law regarding ID cards also stipulates that the police, while carrying out their official duties, can demand to see the ID cards in train stations, long-haul bus stations, ports, airports, and elsewhere.
But in such cases, there are qualifications regarding "people suspected of criminal offenses," or the locations.
When this practice is extended to any citizens anywhere, it might represent a grave contravention of a citizen's basic rights.
Guangzhou police explained that their decision whether to exercise their rights to interrogate would be based on their visual assessment of the people in question.
The "visual assessment" smells frankly of discrimination. Guangzhou lies in a subtropical area where a lot of elderly residents choose to saunter about in shorts and slippers, and nothing more.
Obviously, when the police decide who is suspicious on the basis of their appearance, somebody indifferently dressed would be more vulnerable to cross-examination, while those respectably attired swindlers or even fugitives could easily escape their detection.
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