Six years ago, Beijing’s Ministry of Construction urged Huimin county to solve the dispute. The local party secretary’s response was to recognize that the land had been private property and to offer the equivalent of $22,143 for it, the family said — that is about 3 per cent of what would be paid for a similar-size plot in some other rural areas.

He Siqing, the party chief, did not answer repeated calls to his cellphone. A woman at the Huimin bureau of letters and calls who gave her surname as Liu said on Monday that the county was willing to negotiate. “We’re working on it,” she said.

Yang’s son, Hai Mingyu, a Beijing-based graphic designer, said his mother had been warned before the Olympics not to cause trouble during the Games.

But then he heard about Beijing’s plan to set up the protest pens in three public parks. He decided to stage a protest there. Planning to bring along only his 3-year-old son, he said, he figured he did not need to formally apply for permission.

Of the 77 applications from 149 people that did get filed, all were “withdrawn” or rejected, according to city officials. Rights activists have criticized the pens as an empty and cynical gesture.

When Hai arrived at Ritan Park in downtown Beijing on August 9, he recounted, he noticed a group of foreign journalists taking photographs. As soon as he approached, a Chinese woman asked him where he was from and what his case was about. “It’s no use talking to these journalists,” she told Hai. “They are only here to report on Chinese culture, not protests.”

... contd.