A delegate to China?s parliament yesterday defended the government?s decision to open fire on protesters in the most violent of a series of recent riots and blamed the unrest on ?malicious elements?. At least three people died and eight were wounded in Dongzhou, in the province of Guangdong, in December when police shot villagers protesting against a lack of compensation for land lost to a wind power plant, the government said.

Villagers put the number of dead as high as 20. ?The incident was started by some people with malicious intentions,? said Jiang Haiying, deputy head of the Organisation Department in Shanwei, the city that administers Dongzhou. ?How can you call them common people? They were gangsters,? she said. China is grappling with growing social unrest, fuelled by disputes over land rights, corruption and a growing gap between rich and poor, and maintaining stability in the face of breakneck change is a theme of this year?s annual parliament. In his speech to the opening session yesterday, Premier Wen Jiabao pledged to better handle ?public order disturbances? of which the Ministry of Public Security said there were 87,000 last year. ?We will improve the early warning system for disturbances to social stability and the emergency response mechanism... We will improve all aspects of the People?s Armed Police to make it better able to enforce the law and respond to emergencies.?

Residents said it was the armed police that opened fire, but Jiang said they were acting in self-defence against villagers armed with pipe bombs. Jiang said the building of the wind farm was going ahead and that residents had been compensated. But a woman said that while she had received 200,000 yuan in compensation for the killing of her 26-year-old son, she knew of no payout in exchange for land taken from her family to build the plant.

Lindsay BECK