The 2008 Longnan riot was a protest that turned into a

riot A riot is a form of civil disorder commonly characterized by a group lashing out in a violent public disturbance against authority, property, or people. Riots typically involve destruction of property, public or private. The property targete ...

involving thousands of people in

Longnan Longnan () is a prefecture-level city in the southeast of Gansu province in China. It borders Sichuan on its south and Shaanxi on its east. As of the 2020 Chinese census, the population of the prefecture-level city was 2,855,555. Geography and ...

Gansu Gansu (, ; alternately romanized as Kansu) is a province in Northwest China. Its capital and largest city is Lanzhou, in the southeast part of the province. The seventh-largest administrative district by area at , Gansu lies between the Tibet ...

People's Republic of China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

Cause

The state media did not explain the source of the unrest, though local residents said many protesters were angered by the government's decision to transfer its offices to a wealthier city.International Herald Tribune.
IHT.com
" ''Rioters attack government offices in northwest China.'' Retrieved on 2008-11-18. Residents in Longnan said the disturbances there were fueled by economic distress, unchecked corruption and a lack of transparency by the local

Communist Party A communist party is a political party that seeks to realize the socio-economic goals of communism. The term ''communist party'' was popularized by the title of ''The Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (1848) by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. A ...

Riot

A crowd of about 1,000 - 2,000 people attacked a government office in northwest Gansu province, smashing cars and beating up police and officials.RTHK.
RTHK
." ''Dozens injured in Gansu riot.'' Retrieved on 2008-11-18.NYTimes.

" ''Thousands Battle Police in China’s Northwest.'' Retrieved on 2008-11-18. The crowd eventually grew to 10,000 according to some sources. Armed police officers from the provincial capital used

tear gas Tear gas, also known as a lachrymator agent or lachrymator (), sometimes colloquially known as "mace" after the early commercial aerosol, is a chemical weapon that stimulates the nerves of the lacrimal gland in the eye to produce tears. In ad ...

to subdue the rioters.

Aftermath

Damages are estimated at more than five million yuan (

US$ The United States dollar (symbol: $; code: USD; also abbreviated US$ or U.S. Dollar, to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated currencies; referred to as the dollar, U.S. dollar, American dollar, or colloquially buck) is the official ...

731,000).Sinodaily.
Sinodaily
" ''China arrests 30 over riots in northwest: govt.'' Retrieved on 2008-11-23.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:2008 Longnan Riot

Riots and civil disorder in China

History of Gansu