Chinese scholars, dissidents, and bloggers this week condemned the Chinese Communist Party’s official reaction to the North Korean nuclear test that took place Tuesday after the Party offered up a lukewarm response to Pyongyang’s testing just miles from the border.
The Party also did not inform some residents on the border that an explosion took place, with some local Chinese thinking that the nuclear-triggered aftershock was an earthquake.
After the nuclear test took place on Tuesday morning, the Chinese regime said it “resolutely” opposed the latest nuclear test, according to state media. China has long been a key ally to the isolated, communist regime and any United Nations Security Council resolutions on North Korea has to be vetted by Beijing.
The Chinese regime has remained patient with North Korea, despite the nuclear test and a December rocket launch that successfully sent a satellite into space. The Chinese regime is still not committed to placing harsher sanctions on North Korea after the recent episode.
Communist Party mouthpiece CCTV claimed that the underground nuclear test was “high quality, safe and perfect” and had no effect on the environment. The Chinese Ministry of Environmental Protection released a report on Wednesday saying no nuclear pollution was found in major cities in China.
But there has been a litany of criticism directed at North Korea from Chinese of all walks of life after the test.
Residents of Jilin Province, which is located on the border with North Korea, blasted the Chinese regime and Pyongyang over the nuclear test.
“The authorities did not inform people about the explosion,” an indignant Jilin resident told The Epoch Times. “I found out the news from internet.”
In the city of Baishan in Jilin, near the Changbai Mountains where a dormant volcano is located, locals had more reason to fear. “The residents are panicking because they fear the explosion may have caused the volcano to erupt,” a local travel agency employee told the Epoch Times.
Experts also disagree with CCTV’s claims that the six- or seven-kiloton nuclear blast caused no environmental damage.
German nuclear physicist Fei Liangyong told Sound of Hope Network that nuclear pollution is always emitted during such an explosion. “The temperature at the explosion center rises to tens of millions of degrees, which vaporizes many objects nearby. It also sends out extremely strong radiation and high-temperature, high pressure shock waves in all directions,” Fei said.
“Nuclear dust will be carried to remote areas by wind too,” Fei said, referring to fallout.
Chinese human rights activist Hu Jia also told Sound of Hope that he never trusts any of the data published by Chinese agencies after they openly falsified information relating to the SARS outbreak in the past decade. He also said that much of the air pollution data is doctored.
“I’m deeply, deeply worried,” Hu said of the nuclear blast.
Some critics pointed out that the Chinese regime had no room to blame North Korea for not treating China fairly in its conduct of the nuclear test.
Chinese professor Yu Jianrong wrote on his microblog, “If a country always fails to exercise justice in its foreign policy, others would dare to blow up a stinking bomb at your doorstep.”
“You asked for it,” he wrote.
Political commentator Chen Pokong said that the Chinese regime’s public statements against North Korea were only a show to appease the international community. “Perhaps they want the world to believe they are not always on North Korea’s side,” Chen told Radio Free Asia.
Chen also said that Japan, South Korea, and the United States might also use North Korea’s test to form a regional military alliance.
“This may be the real reason why Beijing is angry at Kim Jong Un, especially due to the current tension between China and Japan” over the Senkaku Islands, Chen said.
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