Government stops an UN-organised global march against hunger in Cambodia because marchers were double their expected number. Man who threw Molotov cocktail against Mao portrait lands in jail.

Beijing (AsiaNews/Agencies) – Chinese police ordered organisers to cancel the Beijing leg of an UN-organised global march against child hunger after more than double the expected number of marchers showed up. Some organisers believe that the government made the decision to avoid having marchers cross Tiananmen Square where, on Saturday, a man threw a Molotov cocktail against Mao’s portrait. The Beijing march was one of a series of such events organised by the World Food Programme in major world capitals throughout the world over a 24-hour period.

Police in Beijing told organisers to call off the event after more than 2,000 people showed up, said Iman Stratenus, a spokesman for one of the groups organising the event. The march was “for the health and safety of the people. [But] there is nothing else we can do.”

Meanwhile Gu Haiou, from Urumqi, is in jail since Saturday evening after he threw a Molotov cocktail against the giant picture of the Great Helmsman.

In a brief report, Xinhua said that the police Tiananmen Square was temporarily cleared of visitors. It also reported that Gu had a history of metal illness.

Other sources said instead that he was unemployed and trying to draw attention to his case and that of millions of Chinese left to fend for themselves without government help against unemployment.

• china
• beijing
• tainanmen
• un-organised
• march
• against
• hunger
• cocktail
• molotov
• attacked