Chinese officials have reportedly continued to make threats against a lawyer who has defended local farmers in Guanxin Province in the south of China. The province is where the Finnish-Swedish forest industry giant Stora Enso is the biggest foreign investor. Lawyer Yang Zaixin says that local police have threatened him with imprisonment, and with the cancellation of his licence if he continues to speak out about the land disputes in the area. “Legal officials also want me to sign a paper in which I would promise not to bring journalists here. I did not agree to that”, Yang says. Helsingin Sanomat reported on the land disputes in Guanxin on April 26th. At the time, Yang had been physically beaten in suspicious circumstances. Nobody was ever arrested for the attack.
Yang says that shady characters have been seen at the plantations, threatening villagers with violence. “Unknown men threatened to beat the villagers if they still talk about the matter in public”, Yang says.
After the land disputes and related violence came out in public, Stora Enso investigated the incidents and instituted changes into its operations in the region. The company has underscored to local officials its disapproval of violence. The company has also paid better compensation to the farmers, and is refraining from leasing land from areas were disputes continue. “I have not heard anything about violence on our land. I don’t know about threats, and I find it hard to believe that the villagers had been intimidated”, said Song Wangiqiu, director of Stora Enso’s Chinese operations. Lawyer Yang confirms that police have not behaved violently toward the villagers since the disputes were made public, and local authorities have not tried to take land from local farmers.
Song has suspicions about Yang. He says that Yang may be using Stora Enso as a weapon in local disputes. According to Song, Yang has threatened the company with negative publicity. All in all, Song says that the Stora Enso project is “very challenging” because of cultural differences and communications difficulties, among other factors. “Undoubtedly many mistakes have been made, but I believe that Stora Enso is the most capable company in carrying out such a project. The culture in our company is one of promoting the principles of sustainable development in a genuine manner, and not just on paper”, Song says. Because of the sensitive nature of the disputes, Stora Enso’s CEO Jouko Karvinen is planning to travel to the area, possibly in late July.
