Hainan Government Seizes Land for Port Expansion: New Customs Operations Fail to Mask CCP’s “Bandit Nature” (Dec 24, 2025)
On December 24, 2025, just seven days after the official launch of Hainan’s island-wide “independent customs operations,” a scene of state-directed land seizure quietly unfolded under the cover of night. This occurred on an island that CCP propaganda has painted as a future global logistics hub and world-renowned financial center.
That night, in Yangpu Port—designated as the core functional area of the Hainan Free Trade Port and an international shipping hub—a forced requisition team comprising hundreds of police officers and government personnel stormed Ganchong Fishing Port. There, they forcibly seized the ancient pier and beaches that local villagers have relied on for generations.
Public documents from the Danzhou Municipal Government reveal that the land acquisition sparking this conflict is intended for the construction of a General Purpose Wharf in the Shentou Port Area’s new operational zone. However, due to excessively low compensation standards, the plan met with unanimous resistance from the villagers. In the days leading up to the seizure, villagers had organized rotating shifts to guard the beach day and night in an attempt to block the advance of engineering machinery.
Yet, in the face of the colossal state apparatus, the villagers’ individual strength proved too fragile. Leaked video footage shows that, in a desperate bid to defend their final living space, villagers engaged in a fierce struggle with the fully armed requisition team. Ultimately, their defensive line collapsed, and the land was lost.
In stark contrast to the violent conflict on the ground, relevant protest videos and pleas for help were swiftly wiped from the simplified Chinese internet. Cloaked under the grand narrative of a “major national strategy,” this act of robbery seemed as if it had never happened.
A local fisherman expressed his grief and anger: “What Free Trade Port? I haven’t seen any substantive change for the common people yet. This so-called Free Trade Port is built upon the displacement of the local population.”
The Hainan Free Trade Port is a major national strategy “personally planned, personally deployed, and personally promoted” by Xi Jinping. The authorities have vowed to build it into a special zone defined by the “rule of law, internationalization, and facilitation.” However, ironically, just one week after the official launch of this grand blueprint’s customs operations, the CCP’s true “bandit nature” has been revealed without a doubt.
Delivery Riders in Zigong, Sichuan Protest Street Blockade and Dismantle Barriers (December 29, 2025)
On Monday (December 29), protests by delivery riders erupted once again in southern China. In Zigong, Sichuan, hundreds of delivery workers, dissatisfied with road closures imposed by property management, collectively blocked streets and dismantled the barriers set up by the management. This marks another collective rights-defense incident triggered by access control issues, following a similar protest in Changsha last week.
According to eyewitnesses and online reports, the conflict stemmed from a sudden decision by the property management of Huashang International City in Ziliujing District, Zigong. On that day, management suddenly used iron barricades to seal off several main entrances to the commercial district to prevent electric motorcycles from entering. As Huashang International City houses numerous catering merchants and is a crucial source of local delivery orders, the move immediately sparked intense dissatisfaction among the riders.
For the riders, the impact of the road closure is devastating. “If we have to walk in to pick up meals, the order will already be overdue by the time we finish the first one,” one rider stated helplessly.
Footage circulating online shows that on the night of the incident, approximately one hundred delivery riders from various platforms gathered at the intersection, with some nearby business owners and passersby stopping to watch. Multiple police officers were on guard at the scene, though no physical clashes were observed. The iron barricades that had originally blocked the road were seen pushed to the ground.
In recent years, delivery platforms have used algorithms to constantly test limits and compress delivery times to the extreme. However, lacking a labor union, riders are unable to negotiate with the platforms and are forced to race against the clock for meager income. In the past, attempts were made to establish a cross-regional alliance and mutual aid network for this massive labor force. Around 2019, delivery rider Chen Guojiang, known as the “Alliance Leader,” initiated the “Delivery Knights Alliance,” attempting to use organized methods to improve riders’ bargaining power against platform rules. However, this endeavor ultimately ended with Chen Guojiang’s arrest and imprisonment.
Today, for this oppressed group, any additional resistance from outside the platform system—whether it be road closures by property management or insults from merchants—can easily become the straw that breaks the camel’s back, instantly igniting long-suppressed anger.
Aftermath of the “Zhejin” Collapse: Days of Fruitless Appeals, Thousands of Investors Break Down in Despair (2025.12.13–27)
Despite having been suppressed by police on December 12, the rights-defense actions of investors from Zhejiang Zhejin Center have continued with great difficulty. Over the following half month, thousands of investors repeatedly gathered at the Zhejin Center’s office and other locations in Shangcheng District, Hangzhou, demanding the return of their hard-earned money. At the protest site on December 25, several more investors were reportedly detained.
According to recent reports by multiple Chinese media outlets, Yu Faxiang, chairman of Xiangyuan Holding Group—who just two months earlier ranked on the Hurun Rich List with an estimated net worth of 14.5 billion yuan—was placed under criminal coercive measures by Shaoxing police on December 12. Those taken into custody alongside him include Ding Jianlin, chairman of Zhejin Center, and a total of 18 core figures implicated in the case.
However, judging from the outcomes of similar cases in the past, the detention of the principal figures does not necessarily mean that funds can be successfully recovered. Although the special task force has frozen more than 1,100 properties and a large amount of equity under the Xiangyuan group, these assets are little more than a drop in the bucket when faced with the enormous funding gap. On the contrary, multiple signs suggest that investors’ funds may ultimately be completely wiped out.
Rumors circulating among the public are even more alarming. One unverified claim suggests that if off-balance-sheet liabilities and various forms of hidden leverage are included, the actual amount involved in the case could exceed 50 billion yuan. Some commentators have compared the incident to a “Zhejiang version of E-Zubao,” arguing that it has dealt a devastating blow to local private wealth—particularly to small private business owners and the pension savings of middle-aged and elderly groups.
Over the past month, although the number of investors participating in rights-defense actions has continued to grow, the collective mood has become increasingly desperate. At a gathering on December 26, many investors suffered emotional breakdowns: loud crying and wailing filled the scene, and some screamed in despair, “Heavens, please help me!” The scene was harrowing.
Dongguan Toy Manufacturing Giant Shuts Down; Workers Receive Only “0.5N” Compensation After Road Blockade Protest (2025.12.14–23)
On December 22, in Dongguan, Guangdong Province, hundreds of workers from Changrong Toy Factory finally received an outcome after nearly ten days of sustained collective action. The compensation offered by this once world-renowned toy manufacturer amounted to only half of the statutory standard stipulated by China’s Labor Law—commonly referred to as “0.5N.”
Founded in 1998, Changrong Toy Factory is one of nine subsidiaries under Hong Kong–based Wah Sing Toys Group. At its peak, Changrong employed as many as 15,000 workers and was a well-known large-scale toy manufacturer. By the time of the incident, however, the number of employees still working at the factory had dwindled to just over one thousand.
According to workers, Changrong Toys began by dismissing all temporary workers in early December. On December 14, without providing any clear explanation, the company attempted to move part of its production equipment out of the factory, triggering strong dissatisfaction among workers. Believing this to be a sign that the company was preparing to flee, workers intercepted the transport vehicles. Events soon confirmed their suspicions. On December 15, the factory officially announced the indefinite implementation of a “five days, eight hours” work schedule, seeking to sharply reduce workers’ income and force them to resign voluntarily. Despite continued protests, Changrong Toys did not reverse the decision. Instead, on December 22, it further announced a two-month shutdown. This move completely ignited pent-up anger, prompting hundreds of workers to leave the factory grounds and block traffic on the road in front of the plant.
Although the road-blocking workers were quickly dispersed by large numbers of police, the action also compelled the local government to intervene in negotiations. Ultimately, under official “coordination,” Changrong Toys agreed to compensate workers at the “0.5N” standard.
The irony is striking: even such a discounted outcome was regarded by workers as a form of “success.” In a reality where the law has been reduced to a mere formality, trade unions remain absent, and authorities often side with capital to suppress workers’ demands, securing tens of thousands of yuan in actual cash compensation is no small feat. Compared with workers at Yilisheng and Seagull Housing Works, whose earlier rights-defense efforts ended in failure, this result can indeed—by comparison—be considered a “success.”
“Forced Land Expropriation for a High-Speed Rail Project in Xi’an, Shaanxi Triggers Violent Clash, Leaving Two Burned (2025.12.17)”
On December 17, a violent confrontation broke out during land expropriation related to the Xi’an–Yan’an High-Speed Rail project in Shaanxi Province, resulting in injuries to two people. The incident occurred in Dongtang Group, Chunshu Village, Xiquan Subdistrict, Lintong District, Xi’an. On the same day, local authorities deployed a large number of personnel to carry out forced land seizures and assaulted villagers who resisted. During the confrontation, one villager fought back using gasoline, burning a member of the expropriation team, while also suffering injuries himself.
Documentary: “The Anti-Discrimination Protest by Food Delivery Riders in Changsha, Hunan”
From December 22 to 23, a protest broke out in Changsha, Hunan Province, triggered by a property owner verbally abusing a delivery rider. Hundreds of food delivery riders blockaded the entrance of a residential compound for more than ten hours and carried out prolonged demonstrations across the city.
“Guangxi Police Deploy Irritant Gas to Force Their Way into a Temple and Detain Worshippers (2025.12.23)”
A violent forced demolition incident occurred this Tuesday in Zhongshan County, Hezhou City, Guangxi. Local authorities dispatched a demolition team of more than one hundred people, including police officers, to forcibly demolish a local folk-religion site. During the operation, police clashed fiercely with villagers who were guarding the temple. At one point, police used unidentified irritant gas to force entry and detained multiple people.
The demolished temple was known as Longfu Temple, located in Xinglongzhai Village Group under Chengshi Village Committee, Zhongshan Town, Zhongshan County. According to villagers, Longfu Temple had existed for many years, but due to long-term neglect it had fallen into disrepair and collapsed. In 2024, villagers raised funds on their own to rebuild it, with construction completed in April this year. At the time of reconstruction, local authorities raised no objections, but recently suddenly declared the temple an “illegal structure” and claimed it was “too close to the ring road,” ordering its demolition.
Villagers said they could not accept this explanation. “I don’t even know what era it was built in—it was already there when I was a child. Now I’m old, and the temple had collapsed long ago with no one taking care of it. It was only rebuilt last year, and we even donated several hundred yuan,” one villager wrote on social media.
Despite strong opposition from residents, local authorities proceeded on December 23, sending a forced-demolition team composed of government officials, police, firefighters, and medical personnel into the village to tear down the temple. Villagers said that to defend it, they divided themselves into two groups: male villagers formed the first line of defense outside the temple to resist the demolition team, while female villagers stayed inside to block entry and prevent the team from entering.
After the demolition began, male villagers outside the temple clashed violently with police armed with batons and shields. Due to the overwhelming disparity in force, the villagers were quickly subdued. Videos from the scene show several villagers being beaten to the ground, with at least four detained by police. Inside the temple, the female villagers were also unable to hold out for long. After attempts to force open the door failed, police released large amounts of white irritant gas into the temple, forcing the villagers to abandon their defense. The temple gate was soon breached, and shortly afterward the entire temple was razed to the ground by the demolition team.
At the scene, one villager said angrily, “The word ‘official’ has two mouths—everything was fine when it was built, but now they say it’s illegal. A temple ordinary people worked so hard to build was wiped out in an instant.”
In recent years, the Chinese Communist Party’s forced demolition of religious sites has intensified. Beyond churches and mosques, countless folk temples and ancestral halls have also fallen victim. Behind these aggressive actions lies the CCP’s deep anxiety over its own ideological crisis—they know well that the theories they promote have long collapsed in the hearts of the people. As a result, the existence of any other belief system is regarded as a threat, one they seek to eliminate through violence in an attempt to ease that fear.
Tens of Millions of “E-Mothers” Ignite a Tsunami of Public Opinion to Seek Justice for Ningbo’s “Little Luoxi” (2025.12.19–21)
On December 19, 2025, after 35 days of desperate appeals and online pleas, the parents of “Little Luoxi” in Ningbo finally received the decisive forensic report they had been waiting for. Yet the appraisal—issued by renowned forensic pathologist Liu Liang—not only failed to calm the controversy; it detonated like a deep-sea bomb, unleashing a rare storm of public opinion across China’s internet. Tens of millions of so-called “e-mothers” clashed fiercely online with organized “water army” accounts representing the interests of Ningbo University Affiliated Women and Children’s Hospital, battling over the final truth behind a lost young life.
Autopsy Truth: A Lethal Surgery That Was “Manufactured”
According to the autopsy report, the cause of death of the five-month-old infant was chilling: intraoperative pulmonary vein obstruction, severe pulmonary edema, damage to the cardiac conduction system, and hemorrhagic shock. What shocked public opinion most, however, was the truth about the alleged heart defect.
Before surgery, medical records and operative notes from the Ningbo women and children’s hospital repeatedly emphasized that Luoxi had a “7-mm sinus venosus atrial septal defect with unroofed coronary sinus syndrome.” This is a complex and rare congenital heart disease—and it was the core reason the lead surgeon, Chen Junxian, strongly urged the family to consent to surgery. He claimed it was “absolutely necessary” and a “basic procedure with a very high success rate.”
The autopsy results brutally shattered that narrative. During dissection, forensic experts found no trace of an “unroofed coronary sinus syndrome” or a “coronary sinus–type atrial septal defect.” Instead, they identified only a 3-mm secundum atrial septal defect. Under current medical consensus, such a small, simple defect is extremely common in infants and carries a very high likelihood of spontaneous closure. Mainstream clinical guidance typically recommends follow-up observation until preschool age, rather than high-risk open-heart surgery in a five-month-old infant.
Moreover, the autopsy revealed internal bleeding of approximately 70 milliliters. For a five-month-old baby, this exceeds half of the total blood volume—meaning the child essentially bled out on the operating table.
“This wasn’t a failed operation—this was murder,” Luoxi’s mother, Ms. Deng, sobbed upon seeing the report. “Chen Junxian, you have children of your own. How could you bear to torment a five-month-old baby for nine hours and let her bleed dry?”
Inside the Profession: Infants as “Guinea Pigs” for Profit?
Why would Chen Junxian operate on a child who was nearly healthy? As the autopsy report surfaced, multiple cardiac surgery specialists and senior physicians offered chilling speculation online.
Some insiders noted that, with China’s declining birth rate and the widespread adoption of prenatal screening, pediatric congenital heart surgery is approaching “patient source exhaustion.” Combined with the siphoning effect of top hospitals in Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou, hospitals in second-tier cities like Ningbo struggle to retain patients. Against this backdrop, Chen Junxian may have been under intense pressure to meet surgical-volume KPIs. Insiders speculate that, despite ambiguous ultrasound findings and recommendations for further CTA confirmation, he skipped additional diagnostic confirmation and rushed Luoxi onto the operating table to keep the case.
An even more disturbing hypothesis is that a fatal intraoperative error was the primary cause of death. A cardiac surgeon using the handle “Curry Chicken” analyzed that Chen may have misidentified the right lower pulmonary vein as the nonexistent “coronary sinus atrial defect” and sutured it, causing pulmonary vein obstruction and triggering severe pulmonary edema and heart failure. In an attempt to conceal the mistake or attempt a salvage, the operation—promised to last three hours—dragged on for more than seven hours, including a second thoracotomy, ultimately resulting in the child’s death.
Online disclosures appeared to corroborate these professional suspicions. One mother said she had a similar experience: in 2024, she took her child to Ningbo University Affiliated Women and Children’s Hospital and also saw Chen Junxian, who used the same rhetoric to persuade her to proceed with surgery. Fortunately, she later took her child to Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine, where doctors told her surgery was unnecessary.
“After opening the chest and finding there was no 7-mm hole—if you realized you couldn’t do it, wouldn’t stitching the child up still have spared her life?” countless netizens asked. But reality was unforgiving: errors on the operating table ultimately took Luoxi’s life. Further digging by online users suggested that Chen Junxian may have been linked to other similar fatal cases that were never properly addressed.
After the autopsy report was released, legal experts noted that if the evidence chain can establish subjective intent on the part of the physician, health authorities should immediately transfer the case to public security organs for criminal investigation under charges such as intentional injury or intentional homicide, rather than confining it to administrative medical accident review.
The Public Opinion War: Whitewashing and Character Assassination
Faced with conclusive autopsy findings and surging public outrage, Ningbo University Affiliated Women and Children’s Hospital and the surgeon involved did not choose to apologize. Instead, they launched a smear campaign against the victim’s family. After the autopsy report was published, the hospital briefly issued a statement attempting to redefine the defect size and justify the surgery, only to delete it within 20 minutes. Meanwhile, numerous influential accounts—including “White-Coated Lynx,” “Bean Mom Liu Fang,” and “Monk Bug Doctor”—posted coordinated, misleading content to “whitewash” the hospital’s actions. Some accounts even maliciously leaked Ms. Deng’s past miscarriage history and other private medical records, attempting to divert public attention through personal attacks.
This crossing of ethical red lines enraged the public. Large numbers of medical professionals, several celebrities, and massive numbers of netizens spoke out in rebuttal, engaging the paid commentators in fierce debate.
“We thought once the results came out, we’d made it ashore—turns out the water is even deeper,” one netizen wrote angrily.
“E-Mothers” Let the “Wind from Ningbo” Blow Across the World
If not for the parents’ resilience—and if not for the courageous community of “e-mothers”—this tragedy might long ago have been buried under the vague label of “surgical complications.”
From the family’s online plea on November 14, to public crying in the town square on the 17th, to today’s nationwide outpouring of support, tens of millions of “e-mothers” have become the backbone of this movement. Because they empathize more deeply, their stance has been more resolute than that of ordinary netizens.
In the early stages, heavy censorship and mass deletions caused public attention to cool. It was the “e-mothers” who launched the relay campaign known as “The Wind from Ningbo,” spreading Luoxi’s story across China and eventually around the world. Over the past month, the group has steadily grown. They have closely followed every move of Luoxi’s mother, publishing articles and videos across platforms, calling out in comment sections, and even paying out of pocket for promotions—all to counter omnipresent censorship.
Their actions extended offline as well. They launched campaigns to place slogans on cars and handbags, determined to carry Luoxi’s story to every corner of the city. They called government offices at all levels in Ningbo to lodge complaints, demanding justice. When related merchandise was taken down from e-commerce platforms, they even began printing and distributing slogans themselves.
As the “e-mothers” put it: “We don’t want to see another baby die in tears because of surgical errors. All we can do is keep bumping the posts and not let the heat fade.” And: “Even if unscrupulous people spread rumors and smears, you have tens of millions of e-parents behind you. You must hold on and see this through, until the wrongdoers are brought to justice.”
Their persistence ensured that the Luoxi case did not fade into silence like so many similar tragedies. Instead, one month later, it has evolved into a phenomenon-level public event, concentrating immense attention and anger.
Seeking Justice in a Rotten System
Despite the forensic conclusion, despite hundreds of millions of eyes watching and tens of millions of “e-mothers” standing in support, Luoxi’s parents still face a long road ahead—because they are confronting entrenched interest networks and a deeply decayed medical system.
One “e-mother” left a message that captured the shared sentiment of many: “The impact of the Luoxi case on me outweighs everything I learned from the sages in the first half of my life. It woke me up. Living in what looks like a prosperous age, I don’t think I’ll ever again be moved to tears by media paeans to ‘peace and prosperity.’”
Central SOE Cuts Features and Slashes Prices: Hundreds of Homeowners in Xi’an Furiously Smash Sales Office (2025.12.19–20)
From December 19 to 20, a fierce homeowners’ rights protest broke out in Xi’an, Shaanxi Province. At CR Land Harbour City (Huaren Gangyue City), a residential project developed by China Resources Land—a central state-owned enterprise (SOE)—a sudden, “halving-style” price cut to clear inventory, combined with long-unresolved allegations of false advertising over school zoning, ignited the anger of hundreds of homeowners. For several days, enraged crowds gathered at the sales office, smashing scale models and damaging parts of the facility.
A Backstab by a Central SOE: “Ten Years of Work Lost Overnight”
The immediate trigger was the recent “halving-style” promotional campaign launched at CR Land Harbour City. Multiple homeowners confirmed that the project’s previous average price was about RMB 15,000 per square meter. Around December 19, however, the developer abruptly slashed prices to RMB 8,500–9,000 per square meter for a “clearance sale.”
A drop of 40–50 percent meant that early buyers saw their assets evaporate almost overnight. One young male homeowner did the math at the protest: “I make 6,000 yuan a month—one night and I lost 600,000.” Another woman said angrily, “The annual bank interest alone is 50,000 yuan—how much can I earn just working by myself?” Some recent buyers said they had purchased less than ten days earlier; before even receiving their homes, their paper losses already exceeded RMB 150,000. For many Chinese families who drained the savings of “six wallets” and took on 30-year mortgages, this plunge is not just numbers on a page but a massive, real loss of assets. A female homeowner angrily confronted the developer on site: “We’ve almost had our families torn apart because of this home—do you know that?”
False Advertising: From “Elite School” to “Village School”
If the price cut was the last straw, then the alleged “school-zone fraud” was the long-buried powder keg. According to homeowners, during early sales CR Land Harbour City implicitly or explicitly suggested the project would be paired with top local schools such as Xi’an’s well-known Tieyi Middle School. A significant portion of the high price reflected the premium buyers paid for an “elite school zone.” After delivery, however, homeowners found that the promised “elite schools” were nowhere to be seen. Instead, they faced an undemolished urban-village environment and the assigned No. 64 Middle School—dismissed by residents as a “village school.”
“We spent several million yuan to send our child here to school—was it just to attend a village school?” a mother demanded at the protest. She said she had taken on debt against her family’s wishes solely for her child’s future. “Now there are arguments at home every day. Our child can’t get into a good school, and our assets have shrunk by more than a million yuan. How are we supposed to live like this?”
In fact, protests over the school zoning had already erupted in June 2025. A group of homeowners known as the “Gangdong Seven” had staged collective demonstrations, accusing China Resources of false advertising after the school promises failed to materialize. Half a year later, the issue remains unresolved—and the drastic price cuts have only intensified the conflict.
The New Normal After the Property Bust
The clash at CR Land Harbour City in Xi’an reflects a broader post-collapse reality of China’s real-estate market. On one side are developers forced to “sell at a loss to survive” amid a prolonged downturn. On the other are homeowners who emptied family savings to buy property, only to watch their assets shrink while continuing to shoulder heavy mortgage payments. Yet even they are not the worst off. Worse still are owners of unfinished, stalled projects—people who cannot even move into their homes but must continue repaying their loans regardless.
Over a Thousand Police Suppress Christians in Wenzhou, Zhejiang; More Than a Hundred Detained (2025.12.13–18)
On the evening of December 15, 2025, an ordinary Monday with neither a traditional festival nor any major local celebration, fireworks suddenly erupted in the government square of Yayáng Town, Taishun County, Wenzhou City, Zhejiang Province.
The fireworks display—reportedly costing more than one million yuan—was so abrupt that it quickly attracted public attention. It inadvertently exposed a large-scale campaign of persecution against Christians unfolding in the town. In the two days prior, thousands of police officers had entered Yayáng Town and carried out concentrated arrests targeting the local Christian community.
A Town Sealed Off by Police: Five Days of Mass Arrests
According to local residents, beginning on December 13, more than a thousand police officers dispatched from Hangzhou, Pingyang, and other areas suddenly poured into Yayáng Town and immediately began arresting Christians. In just two days—December 13 and 14—over one hundred Christians were forcibly taken away. On December 16 and 17, at least four more people were detained. At the same time, all related information was tightly sealed off.
Had it not been for the local government’s ostentatious fireworks display, this large-scale religious persecution might have remained unknown. After two days of mass arrests, authorities abruptly staged a grand fireworks show on the evening of December 15 in front of the Yayáng Town government building. They also mobilized large numbers of online commentators to post videos of the display, accompanied by the slogan, “Listen to the Party, follow the Party.”
Because the day was not a holiday, the fireworks immediately drew widespread online attention. Netizens flooded the comment sections, seeking the real reason behind the display. Awkwardly, since the truth could not be revealed, the paid commentators could only offer vague explanations, claiming that “ordinary people spontaneously set off million-yuan fireworks to celebrate the arrest of an organized crime gang.” This explanation, lacking any logical basis, convinced few.
Fortunately, not everyone succumbed to official pressure. Many local netizens spoke out despite the risks and revealed the truth. It is thanks to these courageous voices that the full picture of this religious persecution has come to light.
Religious Leaders on Wanted Posters
The crackdown focused on two core figures of the local church: 58-year-old Lin Enzhao and 54-year-old Lin Enci. In wanted notices widely posted, authorities labeled the two as “principal suspects of a criminal gang” and offered rewards of 1,000 to 5,000 yuan for information.
However, the notices cited only the vague catch-all charge of “picking quarrels and provoking trouble,” without listing any specific criminal acts. In another announcement, authorities not only failed to present evidence but instead called on the public to “expose” the pair’s alleged illegal activities. This practice of “convicting first and looking for evidence later” is a familiar tactic of the Chinese Communist Party.
Online, local netizens familiar with the situation spoke out: “Rumors stop with the wise—don’t spread them blindly,” and “No one will tell you, because he hasn’t committed any substantive crime.” One comment pointed out bluntly: “Without forcing it, they wouldn’t be able to extract anything illegal.”
In fact, Lin Enzhao, named in the wanted notice, enjoys high prestige among local believers. More than a decade ago, he was imprisoned for protecting church property and opposing the forced removal of crosses. In the official narrative, he is portrayed as a “criminal gang leader”; in the eyes of local Christians, he is a spiritual leader who defends the faith.
The Trigger: “Five Entries, Five Transformations” and the National Flag in Churches
Multiple informed sources say the immediate trigger for labeling the church as an “organized crime group” was its resistance to the officially imposed “Five Entries, Five Transformations” policy—especially its refusal to hang the national flag in the core areas of the church.
The confrontation did not arise overnight. As early as six months ago, tensions had already escalated. In the early hours of June 24, 2025, Yayáng Town head Li Bin personally led a group of more than one hundred people in forcibly entering a Christian meeting site in Yayángxi Village. They smashed the surrounding wall and gate, erected a flagpole, and raised the national flag by force.
For the authorities, the believers’ “noncompliance” in Yayáng was no longer merely a religious issue—it had become a political challenge.
Ten Years of Resistance, Becoming a “Thorn in the Eye”
Yayáng Christians have become a “thorn in the authorities’ side” because of their decade-long resilience. Since Zhejiang launched large-scale cross removals in 2014, Yayáng Christians have remained on the front lines of resistance—from believers physically guarding crosses in July 2014, to bloody clashes in April 2017 at Banling Church after it refused to install surveillance cameras. The local believers demonstrated strong organization and cohesion.
It was precisely this unity that allowed the crosses of three churches in Taishun County to survive the demolition campaign. In the eyes of local officials, “dealing with” the Yayáng Christian community represented a rare opportunity to manufacture political achievements.
Xi Jinping Pushes “Sinicization of Religion”; Underground Churches Face a Harsh Winter
After the arrests, authorities convened a so-called “Anti–Six Evils” mobilization rally in Yayáng Town on December 18. While deploying special police in a show of force, they also attempted to place a stamp of “justice” on this purge targeting a faith community.
Viewed alongside Xi Jinping’s September 29 speech calling for the “systematic advancement of the Sinicization of religion,” and the recent mass arrests targeting Beijing’s Zion Church, the CCP appears to be seeking to completely dismantle China’s underground churches through the criminalization of charges and the demonization of individuals.
For the remaining house churches in China, a truly bitter winter has already arrived.
