To the carnage and destruction in Ukraine, to the continuing conflict in and around Syria, to the 10 weeks of turmoil in Iran, the neighbourhood to the east of Europe and beyond is looking more uncertain than it has for a long time. Now, to this trio of conflicts, each of which has the potential to spread, must be added a global dimension with the prospect of unrest in the world’s most populous country.
It was snatched mobile phone footage posted on social media that first alerted the outside world to the dramas unfolding in China over the past week. Crowds of angry Chinese could be seen thronging the streets of Shanghai, shouting and chanting for the end of Communist Party rule and the removal of the party leader, Xi Jinping. Such an overt challenge to the powers that be is not something that happens every day in China, but it seems to be happening now rather more often, and breaking out simultaneously across more of the country.
The immediate trigger for the protests in China’s richest and most cosmopolitan city was the death toll in a fire more than 2,000 miles away in Urumqi, in the westernmost province of Xinjiang. And the anger appears to have been ignited by a belief that the victims might have been saved but for the quarantine lockdown in force at the time.
