The Chengdu Overpass Protest and Its Antecedents: “The People Do Not Want a Political Party With Unchecked Power”

Concerns Grow as Protester Who Unfurled Pro-Democracy Banners in China Goes Missing

A Chinese man appears to have been forcefully disappeared after videos and photos circulated of a rare protest condemning the Communist rule in China, rights advocates said. A brief video and images that surfaced on the overseas social media platform X on late April 14 showed three unfurled banners in Chengdu, a city in southern China. The banners took aim directly at the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). “The people do not need a political party w…

The Chengdu Overpass Protest and Its Antecedents: “The People Do Not Want a Political Party With Unchecked Power”

In the early hours of the morning of April 15, 2025, a lone protester lashed three long white banners with red, hand-painted political slogans to the railings of a pedestrian overpass near a bus station in Chengdu, and unfurled them to the street below. As he would later confide to the owners of several whistle-blowing social media accounts to whom he turned for help in amplifying his message, it was a protest he had been planning for over a yea…