BEIJING – China has told its widely criticised courts to install metal detectors and beef up security following a series of attacks on judges, a newspaper said on Wednesday.
Courts should separate judges' benches from the public, install monitoring equipment and have police escort judges to and from the building, China's Supreme Court and top prosecuting body ordered, the Beijing News said.
A female judge was killed in her office in eastern Jiangsu province earlier this year, a judge in Beijing was run over and then beaten up by the driver, and in June a mob of more than 20 people stormed a court on the outskirts of the capital and assaulted a judge, the newspaper said.
The report did not explain why the attacks took place.
China's judicial system has come under close public scrutiny following a series of high-profile wrongful convictions, such as that of a butcher executed in 1989 for murder and proved innocent this June when his “victim” turned up alive.
In another widely publicised case, a man was freed in April after serving 11 years in jail for his wife's murder following his wife's reappearance with a new husband.
The man said he had been tortured into admitting the crime, sparking outrage across China over policy brutality and the court's acceptance of a forced confession.
Rights groups have long criticised China's judicial system as arbitrary and as an instrument for the ruling Communist Party to maintain its grip on power.
