China rail crash families accept compensation as Beijing moves to silence furore

China's premier Wen Jiabao places flowers as he mourns the victims who died during the high-speed train crash at Wenzhou, in Zhejiang province. Photograph: Str/AFP/Getty Images

Relatives bereaved by China's high-speed rail crash have accepted compensation after the government doubled its original offer, as authorities tried to silence the furore over the disaster. Ten families have agreed to the deal – 915,000 yuan (?87,000) per victim – the state news agency reported. The death toll is now 40, with another 190 injured.

Other relatives say the compensation is insufficient and that the ministry of railways, which has apologised for last weekend's disaster, should take more responsibility. "Our deceased relatives were in the prime of their lives; they have children and senior parents to support," said Chen Engfen. He said he would not accept less than ?141,000.

The crash, near Wenzhou in Zhejiang province, happened when one train ploughed into the back of another. Six coaches were derailed, with four plunging from a viaduct. Officials have blamed design flaws in signalling and are checking the equipment at 58 other stations.

The disaster, and the government's handling of it, unleashed an outpouring of anger. Many see the crash as epitomising the problems facing China in its headlong rush towards development, including the lack of transparency.

However, unusually aggressive reporting has come to an abrupt halt. "Some newspapers have been told not to run articles, or had prepared far harder coverage but at the last minute had the rug pulled out from under them," said David Bandurski of Hong Kong University's China Media Project.

China has seen a similar pattern in previous disasters, with censors shutting down discussion and relatives coming under pressure to sign compensation deals and stop raising questions about the incident.

Japan's Asahi Shimbun reported a relative as saying the family stopped protesting about the crash "because pressure was applied privately".

Chinese journalists have said that a television producer was disciplined after his programme asked searching questions about the crash. A note on Wang Qinglei's microblog said that "as long as a country has journalists who resist pressure… it still has a soul".

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Northern Ireland violence drives out immigrant families

Nationalist youths clash with police in the Ardoyne area of Belfast on 12 July. Photograph: Cathal Mcnaughton/Reuters

Immigrant families from East Timor fled a Catholic area of Northern Ireland on Friday night when loyalist rioters tried to attack nationalist homes, a Sinn Fein councillor said today.

"Around 100 loyalists attacked police who prevented them attacking nationalist homes," said John O'Dowd, who is a member of the Northern Ireland Assembly.

The families from East Timor packed their bags and ran from their homes in Portadown, Co Armagh on Friday night, when the area was engulfed in violence, he said.

"They packed their bags, so distressed were they at the violence. Their neighbours tried to reassure them that they would be safe in their homes but they left," he told Reuters.

A significant number of families from East Timor have settled in the Northern Irish town, where they work in the food packing industry alongside many Poles and Portuguese.

For several hours, police were attacked by people armed with petrol bombs, bricks, bottles, fireworks and other missiles in the latest violence surrounding the high point of the loyalist marching season.

The police fired around 20 plastic bullets and arrested three people. They confirmed that loyalists provoked the violence when a planned peaceful protest was hijacked by a violent minority.

The Mayor of the local Craigavon council, Democratic Unionist Alan Carson, condemned the violence.

"This does not do anyone any good. People have a right to live peacefully and feel safe in their own homes. The violence we saw last night is something we assigned to the history books," he said.

In recent days, nearly 50 police have been wounded and dozens have been arrested during violence in both loyalist and republican areas surrounding the annual 12 July parades.

More than 500 parades were held on Tuesday across Northern Ireland, the high point of the Orange Order marching season celebrating the victory of Protestant King William of Orange over Catholic King James at the Battle of the Boyne in 1690. The majority passed off peacefully but they sparked outbreaks of street violence.

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Beckhams a 'bad example' for families

David and Victoria Beckham with their sons (from left to right) Brooklyn, Cruz and Romeo. Photograph: David Davies/PA

David and Victoria Beckham may have been overjoyed to welcome their new daughter, Harper Seven, last week but, according to a growing group of campaigners, the birth of their fourth child make the couple bad role models and environmentally irresponsible.

As the world's population is due to hit seven billion at some point in the next few days, there is an increasing call for the UK to open a public debate about how many children people have.

Now the Green MP, Caroline Lucas, has joined other leading environmentalists in calling for the smashing of what TV zoologist Sir David Attenborough has called the "absurd taboo" in discussing family size in the UK.

Lucas said: "We need to have a far greater public debate about population, whether it focuses on improving family planning or reducing global inequality – and looking again at how we address the strain on our natural resources. The absence of an open and honest discussion about this issue means most people don't give much thought to the scale of global population growth in recent years. In 1930, just one or two generations ago, the world's population stood at around two billion. Today it is around seven billion, and by 2050 it is projected to rise by a third to 9 billion.

"We live as if we have three planets instead of just one. It is interesting that public figures, environmental groups and NGOs in general have tended to steer away from population to the extent that it's become a taboo issue. The horrific consequences of China's one-child policy and of other draconian efforts to regulate procreation have, for many, rendered discussion of the subject completely unpalatable. Yet as long as an issue remains a taboo subject where no one talks about it, then there's very little chance of finding the solutions we need."

It is a view that is being pushed by the UK-based Optimum Population Trust, whose chief executive, Simon Ross, is calling for the government to tackle the UK's high rates of accidental pregnancy and to give child benefits and tax credits only for the first two children. "That would send a clear signal that the government will support sustainable families, but after that you are on your own," he said. "There is a big issue there, family planning is cheap, yet many people don't use it properly and accidental pregnancy rates are very high. We need to change the incentives to make the environmental case that one or two children are fine but three or four are just being selfish.

"The Beckhams, and others like London mayor Boris Johnson, are very bad role models with their large families. There's no point in people trying to reduce their carbon emissions and then increasing them 100% by having another child," he said. "England is one of the most densely populated countries in the world and the fastest-growing in population terms in Europe. In 15 years we'll have an extra 10 million people here."

Attenborough has attacked the last two UN climate summits in Cancun and Copenhagen for ducking the population issue. Giving the President's Lecture at the Royal Society of Arts in March, he made a passionate speech about how the world's baby-making was damaging the planet and called for every country to have a population policy. "The sooner we stabilise our numbers the sooner we stop running up the down escalator," he said.

"Fifty years ago there were about 3 billion people on Earth. Now there are almost 7 billion – almost double – and every one of them needing space. There cannot be more people on this Earth than can be fed."

The population debate has often been overshadowed by what is seen as the disastrous and often inhumane experiment by China, with its notorious one-child policy, and with sensitivity about being seen to criticise birthrates in underdeveloped countries. But campaigners point to the fact that it is the populations of the developed world who use the vast majority of the world's resources.

Lucas said the Green party was not afraid to raise the subject because it was "fundamental" to wellbeing. "The lesson to be learned from China is surely that efforts to curb population growth in a way that restricts individual liberty are dangerous and come at huge human cost," she said. "Policies that focus on increasing access to birth control for all who want it, reducing poverty and inequality, improving food security and tackling environmental degradation are where we should be focusing our attention.

"At its heart, this is a debate about poverty and inequality, as well as about sustainability – and we believe that strong policies to reduce the yawning gulf between rich and poor should underpin every effort to address it.

"I don't believe that government incentives or laws to that effect are what we need. As a richer country, we face different challenges when it comes to population than those in the developing world, where high birth rates are linked to dire poverty and inequality. It's an equally important issue for both richer and poorer nations – this is a global debate which affects us all."

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