China Sentences 4 More to Death, Arrests 3,182 in Crackdown

China sentenced four people to death Wednesday, announced the arrest of more than 3,000 others and vilified a top dissident as an admirer of Adolf Hitler.

At least 29 people have already been executed for rioting, sabotage or resisting the army during the crackdown last month that left many protesters dead.

The latest death sentences were reported by the official Beijing Evening News, which said the four condemned had committed crimes of robbery and violence during the unrest in May and June.

It said that Li Wenbao, 20, and Liang Hongchen, 18, “used the rebellion as an opportunity” to rob passers-by in a Beijing suburb. It said two other men were sentenced to death for theft, murder and rape.

Another official newspaper, the Xinhua Daily in Nanjing in eastern Jiansu province, said 3,182 people were arrested in the province in a three-day campaign against political dissidents and criminals.

In Beijing, the Beijing Daily newspaper said university teacher Liu Xiaobo, a key dissident arrested in June, “despised his yellow-skinned compatriots and groveled before Westerners” and suggested that he hoped to create a new and superior race by interracial breeding. It quoted him as saying “I very much admire Hitler.”