560,000 volunteers keep orderly streets

Hundreds of thousands of red armband-wearing volunteers will help maintain public order on the streets during the two sessions, national legislative meetings taking place in the capital from Saturday until March 14th, the Beijing Municipal Public Security Bureau confirmed Sunday.

During this period, 560,000 volunteers, consisting of retirees and neighborhood committee staff, will be stationed in areas including roads around hotels accommodating representatives and other places representatives may visit.

In Haidian district, where there are several hotels housing delegates, more than 100,000 volunteers will patrol in different shifts. In the Zizhuyuan area alone, there will be around 4,000 security volunteers, according to Haidian district government's website.

Yesterday, there were a number of volunteers dressed casually, but sporting red armbands which said "public security patrol staff" in Chinese, along Dawang Lu in Chaoyang district.

Zhu Ping, 73, is a retired primary school teacher who lives nearby. Yesterday Zhu started patrolling at 9:00 am. She said she and her fellow volunteer, Wang Zhimin, an 80-year-old retiree from a tool factory, would be patrolling from 9-11 am and 2-6 pm, and they will help out on two more days before the end of the two sessions.

"A neighborhood committee employee called me to volunteer," said Zhu, "We're not paid but it doesn't matter. It's a way to learn from Comrade Lei Feng," she said.

Another retiree, surnamed Wei, said that on regular occasions, such as the annual two sessions and October 1 National Day holiday, she and her neighbors were often asked to help maintain public order by their neighborhood committee.

"Our main duty is to make sure there are no suspicious gatherings on the streets," Wei said, "But we rarely found any over the past years."