China quake survivors take to streets

Survivors of the deadly Sichuan earthquake took to the streets in southwestern China, witnesses and a rights group said on Thursday, protesting low compensation for their soon-to-be demolished homes.

"Around 200 people sat on the side of the road and blocked traffic and many policemen surrounded them," a businessman who refused to be named said from Mianyang city, near the epicentre of the May 2008 quake in Sichuan province.

The protesters live in Beichuan -- one of the worst hit areas of the quake -- where a new town is being built, the Hong Kong-based Information Centre for Human Rights and Democracy said.

According to the rights group, thousands of houses and temporary homes are to be torn down to make way for the new town and the government has given residents too little money to rent other places, leaving some homeless.

A waiter in a restaurant near the protest, which took place on Wednesday close to the building that houses Mianyang prefecture's government, said he saw the quake survivors walking on the road flanked on either side by police.

"I heard there were some fights," he said, but could not provide further details.

The local police refused to comment and the Mianyang government was not immediately reachable.

The town of Beichuan was devastated in the earthquake that struck Sichuan province on May 12, 2008, leaving nearly 88,000 dead or missing in total.