The Chinese authorities sentenced more than 6,100 people to death in 1996, and carried out at least 4,367 executions, according to a report today by Amnesty International, a human rights organization based in London. Eager to prove their credentials, several provinces began their campaigns by retrying and sentencing to death offenders previously sentenced to fixed terms of imprisonment. In many cases, local officials exercised broad discretion in deciding what constituted a capital case. A man named Lu Qigang was sentenced to death for sticking thorns and needles into the buttocks of female cyclists near the farm in Beijing where he worked. This brief glimpse of China is regrettable.
China holds enormous potential for discovery.
But I am completely unprepared for this country and must move on. Nevertheless, I am intrigued by the brusque manners, loud conversations, perpetual spitting, unusual-looking food, legions of sales clerks, and the digital weight scale that hailed me in a computerized voice as I walked past. After our monstrous breakfast, it said I weighed 155 pounds. A few pounds low - maybe I should have broken the no bread rule and eaten a half dozen Danish pastries. All rights reserved.