Three Chinese, two men and a woman, staged a brief demonstration outside Beijing-based Indonesian embassy to China on Sunday, demanding the release of all the 75 Chinese fishermen seized by Indonesia two weeks ago.
They unfurled a banner reading in Chinese "Deeply mourning for the fishermen killed in Nansha! The Nansha Islands belong to Chinese territory for ever, and we demand the immediate and unconditional release of all fishermen."
An embassy official went out and talked to the leader of the protestors for a while and accepted the banner.
The leader, Ouyang Yuping, told Xinhua that they were farmers from the eastern Jiangxi Province, and they came to Beijing by train Saturday.
The demonstration lasted for about 10 minutes and they were persuaded to leave by police officers.
Eight fishing boats from south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region were detained by Indonesia on June 20 while in China's traditional fishing grounds off the Nansha islands on the South China Sea, Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang told a regular press briefing late last month.
Qin did not reveal the number of fishermen seized, but the Chinese newspaper Global Times has quoted sources as saying that altogether 75 have been detained. They are still being held.
China has expressed strong dissatisfaction with Indonesia for detaining the fishermen and demanded the immediate release of the men and their boats.
(Xinhua News Agency July 5, 2009)
