Reuters AlertNet Full site
Homepage | Newsdesk | NGO Latest | Crisis briefings | Country profiles | MediaWatch | Jobs | Alerting | Login

NEWSDESK

China man held over injection deaths dies in custody
14 Jan 2009 05:22:19 GMT
 Source: Reuters
BEIJING, Jan 14 (Reuters) - A Chinese man died in detention while police were investigating his possible role in six hospital deaths, state media reported on Wednesday, with suggestions of torture compounding the earlier medical tragedy.

Wan Jianguo, a medical company salesman, was taken by police in July last year to "assist inquiries" after six patients died after injections of immunoglobulin at a hospital in Nanchang, capital of Jiangxi province in eastern China.

In August, 35 days after police took Wan, they told his wife, Wu Peifen, that he had died in an "abnormal" way, the China News Service reported on Wednesday.

Five months after Wan's death, Wu has still not received any autopsy report and has been told the "cause of death is unknown", the agency reported, citing a television report.

Seven police officers are in "criminal detention" over Wan's death, including one given bail. Senior Nanchang officers refused to comment on the case.

But the news report cited one unnamed police source there as saying the officers wanted the glory of breaking a major case and "had not expected the tragedy of someone being beaten to death".

Wan's death brings together contention over two of Chinese citizens' biggest complaints: a rickety health system that exposes patients to shoddy and dangerous drugs, and a police force that long gave little heed to suspects' rights.

The government has repeatedly said it has moved far to ending torture. But human rights groups disagree. And on Wednesday, the nation's own official People's Daily cited one law professor who said police torture had "defied repeated bans".

"Banning use of torture to extract confessions is our country's consistent policy," said Fan Chongyi, a professor at the Chinese University of Political Science and Law.

"Just lecturing doesn't work. We must create an institute to block it."

The paper praised one experiment in northeast China to recruit citizen-inspectors to monitor police and their treatment of detainees. (Reporting by Chris Buckley; Editing by Nick Macfie and Dean Yates)


AlertNet news is provided by
Email this article       Send comments

NGO latest

•  China Red Cross clinic helps reduce health vulnerabilities
IFRC - Switzerland

MORE >>

Latest news

•  China man held over injection deaths dies in custody

•  FACTBOX-The North Korea problem awaiting Obama

•  China warns of more health scares amid slowdown

•  Peru protesters say tortured by police, miner

•  Clinton: six-party talks are 'a vehicle' on N.Korea

MORE >>

AlertNet news is provided by

Background information

Facts & figures
China

Related articles

Breaking stories
 China man held over injection deaths dies in custody (1 minute ago)

FACTBOX-The North Korea problem awaiting Obama (1 minute ago)

AlertNet insight
 Disaster-heavy 2008 raises pressure for climate pact, insurance (1 minute ago)

Aid agency news feed
 China Red Cross clinic helps reduce health vulnerabilities (1 minute ago)

Blogs
 Peace game to help train disaster responders (1 minute ago)

Maps
 MAP: GLOBAL: Rabies, countries or areas at risk (2008) (1 minute ago)


Del.icio.us Del.icio.us  |   Digg Digg  |   NewsVine NewsVine  |   Reddit Reddit   
Thumb for /thefacts/imagerepository/RTRPICT/2009-01-13T083500Z_01_PEK002_RTRIDSP_2_CHINA-COAL_mainimage.jpg|/thenews/pictures/PEK002.htm
Thumb for /thefacts/imagerepository/RTRPICT/2009-01-13T083441Z_01_PEK01_RTRIDSP_2_CHINA-COAL_mainimage.jpg|/thenews/pictures/PEK01.htm
Thumb for /thefacts/imagerepository/RTRPICT/2009-01-13T061724Z_01_SEO02_RTRIDSP_2_SSANGYONG_mainimage.jpg|/thenews/pictures/SEO02.htm
Thumb for /thefacts/imagerepository/RTRPICT/2009-01-13T061533Z_01_SEO01_RTRIDSP_2_SSANGYONG_mainimage.jpg|/thenews/pictures/SEO01.htm
Thumb for /thefacts/imagerepository/RTRPICT/2009-01-08T061427Z_01_PEK300_RTRIDSP_2_BIRDFLU-CHINA_mainimage.jpg|/thenews/pictures/PEK300.htm

A worker transports blocks of coal at a coal storage facility in Shenyang, Liaoning province, January 13, 2009. China's coal demand will continue to grow this year thanks to policies to ...


More pictures | Galleries
Disclaimers |  Copyright |  Privacy |  Contact Us |  Feedback |  About Us |  RSS XML

Last updated:Wed Jan 14 05:24:44 2009