Beijing starts all-round bus safety checks

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2008-08-05 16:54

About 25,000 security personnel started working on thousands of Beijing buses and at bus stations on Friday to remove possible safety risks during the Olympic Games.

Bus safety has become a focus of the Olympic security deployment after a bus explosion in Shanghai in May that killed three and two others in Kunming that left two dead in July.

"I only check the suspicious passengers according to my experiences because of the large flow of people," said Wang, a conductor and safety supervisor of the No. 9 bus and identified by her red armband printed with "Beijing Bus Security Check."

"I will ask him to open his bags if somebody shows uneasy symptoms."

The security personnel, comprising mechanics, management and support personnel of the Beijing Public Transport Holdings Ltd., were deployed "at every bus station and on every bus" starting from Aug. 1, according to Zhang Guoguang, company president.

Passengers carrying contraband goods were asked to discard the goods, otherwise they would be advised not to take the bus. The security personnel would report to police if suspicious passengers insisted on boarding the bus, Zhang said.

Lin Qiang, a visitor from the eastern Jiangxi Province, was stopped by a security check at a bus station beside the Beijing West Railway Station at 9 a.m.. His five bags, full of local snacks, were opened for a check.

"I knew Beijing had strengthened the security check before I came," said the 35-year-old man. "It is a bother but safety is first. I understand it."

As of Thursday, Beijing commuters have been facing tighter security checks when subway passengers had to submit all bags for screening.

A small plastic bag carried by a Xinhua reporter was also subject to an examination by a metal detector handset on Friday morning in Chongwenmen metro station.

Beijing started the three month security campaign on June 29 in an effort to keep dangerous articles, including guns, ammunition, knives, explosives, flammable and radioactive materials and toxic chemicals out of the metro system to ensure security during the Olympics and Paralympics.

Over the past month, only large bags were required for checks. To date, more than 3,400 forbidden items had been detected and some 2,000 people had been barred since the measures were imposed. Of all the confiscated materials, 90 percent was flammable such as paint.

Flammable materials and ammonium nitrate explosives were blamed for the bus explosions in Shanghai and Kunming. The blasts sent an alarm to bus administrators and prompted strengthened security checks across China.

Shenyang, capital of the northeast Liaoning Province, the site of 12 Olympic football matches, installed metal detectors in buses on all the 177 bus lines on Friday to ensure safety.

In Shanghai, the country's economic center and also a host for some Olympic football games, video cameras for the purpose of security monitoring were currently being installed on more than 1,600 buses passing Shanghai Stadium.

Metro trains and stations in the 17 million population city will also be equipped with video cameras, X-ray scanners and masks as precautionary measures.

In the coastal resort Qingdao, which will host the Olympic sailing events, increased anti-terror measures were installed on all buses and taxis.

"The upgraded security measures in those places are within a plan and are necessary. It also follows international practice," said Li Wei, director of the anti-terrorism research center of the China Institute of Contemporary International Relations.