Anonymous Call for Xi to Quit Rattles Party Leaders in China
匿名信事件和中共党内的权力焦虑
BEIJING — An anonymous letter calling on President Xi Jinping to resign for the good of China and his own safety seemed to be digital rumor-mongering when it appeared on the Internet this month. It spread by email and lingered on a small domestic Chinese news site before it was removed.
北京——当一封呼吁国家主席习近平下台的匿名信本月出现在网络上时，这似乎只是网上的流言。文中要求习近平为中国的利益，也为他自身安全考虑，辞去职务。这封信通过邮件传播，曾短暂出现在一家小型中国新闻网站上，之后很快被删除。
But the response from Beijing has been anything but dismissive.
但北京对这一事件的反应，绝非不以为然。
Surprising even some hardened critics, Mr. Xi's security forces have overseen a far-reaching inquisition to root out the culprits behind the letter, resorting to measures that have drawn more attention than the letter itself. They have detained at least 11 people, including relatives in China of two exiled writers accused of spreading or promoting the letter.
习近平的安全部门进行了范围甚广的调查行动，为找出并铲除匿名信的撰写和传播者，不惜采取比匿名信本身更引人注目的措施。这让一些久经历练的批评者都倍感意外。他们羁押了至少11人，其中包括两名中国流亡作家的亲属。这两人被指传播和宣传了上述匿名信。
Mr. Xi's handlers have sought to grace him with an aura of unshakable dominance. But the unusually severe response to what might be nothing more than an outlandish Internet ruse suggests some anxiety about his hold on power, including among security officials keen to show their loyalty and avoid any hint of exposing him to danger, experts said.
习近平的助手试图营造出一种他的地位坚不可摧的氛围。然而，一些专家表示，对有可能不过是无聊网络把戏的行为做出异常严厉的反应，表明有人对习近平手中权力是否稳固存在担忧，包括一些安全官员热衷于表忠心，避免出现任何有关他处于危险之中的蛛丝马迹。
"The response has shown how jittery they are," said Kerry Brown, professor of Chinese politics at King's College, London. "The fear seems to be that these views might be taken as representative of real elite figures."
"这种反应显示出他们有多么不安，"在伦敦国王学院(King's College)研究中国政治的教授凯利·布朗(Kerry Brown)说。"他们似乎是在担忧，这些观点会被当成真正的精英人物的典型观念。"
Xiao Qiang, an adjunct professor at the University of California, Berkeley, who monitors Chinese media for the website China Digital Times, attributed the response in part to the letter's unusual phrasing. "Bluff or true, this tone sounds more like coup plotters talking to the leader they want to depose, rather than an open letter with dissenting political views," he said.
There is no evidence that any coup plot could be in the works. Mr. Xi appears firmly in control; this week he has been visiting the Czech Republic, and he is scheduled to arrive in Washington on Thursday for a nuclear security meeting.
没有证据表明有什么政变正在酝酿之中。习近平似乎大权在握；本周他正在捷克共和国访问，周四他将抵达华盛顿，参加一场核安全会议。
But the government's alarmed reaction has highlighted the alternating pulls of swaggering confidence projected outward and internal anxiety about political control driving Mr. Xi to stamp down harder on critics, said several people embroiled in or closely watching the investigation.
不过，被卷入或在密切关注这次调查的几人表示，中国政府的警惕反应突显出两股交替出现的力量：一是对外表现出的无比自信，二是对政治掌控力的内在担忧。正是这种忧虑，驱使习近平更严厉地打压批评人士。
"Xi Jinping wants full control, and for the letter to appear on a domestic website marked a loss of control," said Zhang Ping, a Chinese journalist and rights advocate living in Germany, whose siblings have been detained in southwest China as part of the investigation.
"习近平是要控制一切，而且这封信在国内新闻网站出现算是一种失控，"旅居德国的中国新闻记者、人权活动人士张平说道。在这次调查行动中，他的几位家人在中国西南部遭到羁押。
Mr. Zhang, who writes under the pen name Chang Ping, said two younger brothers were held by the police in Sichuan Province after his immediate family and even distant relatives were told to tell him to remove from the Internet an essay he wrote condemning the detention of a Chinese journalist, Jia Jia, possibly over the letter.
张平通常以笔名"长平"写作，他表示自己的两个弟弟被四川警方扣押。在此之前，他的近亲，甚至包括一些关系比较远的亲戚被要求给他传话，要他从网上删除自己之前撰写的一篇谴责拘押中国媒体人贾葭的文章。文中表示后者很可能是因上述匿名信被拘。
Mr. Zhang said it would be impossible to take down the essay, which was published on a Chinese-language website of Deutsche Welle, the German news service. Mr. Jia has since been released.
张平表示，他不可能从网上删除那篇发表在德国之声(Deutsche Welle)中文网站上的文章。目前，贾葭已被释放。
The police said Mr. Zhang's brothers were suspected of illegally starting a fire by burning joss sticks and paper at ancestral graves. But Mr. Zhang dismissed that as an excuse to put pressure on him.
警方表示，张平的弟弟因在祖坟上燃香烧纸钱而涉嫌违法纵火。但张平认为这只是一个借口，是为了向他施压。
His family was told the brothers were in the hands of the state security arm of the police, he said. His younger sister was also missing, almost surely detained, he added.
他说自己的家人被告知，两个弟弟现在人在公安体系中的国保部门手里。他还表示，他的妹妹也失踪了，几乎可以肯定也是遭到了羁押。
Wen Yunchao, a Chinese writer and rights activist living in New York, has said that his parents and younger brother in southern China were also detained by the police after being pressed to tell him to admit to spreading the letter online. He has refused, adamantly denying disseminating the letter.
生活在纽约的中国作家、人权活动人士温云超表示，他在中国南方生活的父母和弟弟也遭到了警方的羁押，此前他们被迫转告他，要他承认在网上传播了那封匿名信。温云超拒绝了这一要求，并坚决否认自己传播了这封信。
The letter appeared online on March 4, just before China's national legislature started its annual session. It lays out accusations against Mr. Xi from "loyal Communist Party members," using a mix of old-school party jargon and liberal criticisms that makes its true authorship difficult to discern.
这封匿名信于3月4日出现在网上，恰逢全国人民代表大会年度会议召开前夕。信中一一陈述了"忠诚的共产党员"对习近平的各项指控。其文风既有老式党八股特色，又有自由派的批评风格，让人很难分辨作者的真实身份。
Mr. Xi has amassed too much power, betraying the party's recent traditions of collective decision-making, it says. He has abandoned the calibrated foreign policy of Deng Xiaoping for dangerous adventurism, it continues, and has turned the news media into servile tools for promoting his own image.
信中表示，习近平掌握了太多的权力，违背了共产党近些年秉承的集体决策传统。根据文中的说法，他抛弃了邓小平既定的外交方针，追求危险的冒进，并把新闻机构变成了推广他个人形象的奴性十足的工具。
"Comrade Xi Jinping, you do not possess the abilities to lead the party and the country into the future," it says.
"习近平同志，你不具备带领党和国家走向未来的能力，"信中写道。
This is not the first time that an anonymous online message has rattled party leaders.
这不是网上第一次出现抨击中共领导人的匿名信息。
In 2011, the government of Hu Jintao, Mr. Xi's predecessor as president and party leader, ordered a sweeping crackdown and tightened Internet censorship after anonymous messages spread online calling on citizens to join a peaceful "Jasmine Revolution" inspired by uprisings across the Middle East.
2011年，在网上出现呼吁民众参加"茉莉花革命"的匿名言论后，习近平的前任、当时的国家主席兼中共中央总书记胡锦涛领导的政府下令全面打压，并加强了互联网审查。"茉莉花革命"是一场受中东各地的反抗运动影响的和平运动。
But the hunt for the letter's authors suggests Mr. Xi is taking security controls to greater lengths.
不过，此次追查公开信作者的行动表明，习近平正在扩大安全管控。
"They're extending their hands abroad," Su Yutong, a Chinese journalist and rights advocate based in Bonn, Germany, said by telephone. "We were receiving attention before, but now even more."
"他们在国外插手越来越深，"现居德国波恩的中国记者、维权人士苏雨桐在电话上说。"过去我们受到重视，但现在是更多的。"
The security authorities appear to be using the investigation into the letter to target young exiled activists adept at using the Internet to spread news and stay in touch with people and events in China, she said.
她说，安全机构似乎正在借调查公开信的机会，把目标对准流亡在外的年轻活动人士。这些人擅长用互联网传播消息，并与国内的人和事保持联系。
"For a town police station in an isolated part of China to demand that German media, Deutsche Welle, remove an article of mine, that's absurd," said Mr. Zhang, the writer in Germany. "It wouldn't have happened before."
"现在是有一个偏僻镇的派出所提出要撤德国媒体——德国之声——的稿子，是很荒唐的，"现居德国的张平说。"过去不可能出现的。"
Chinese officials were probably most upset by the letter's suggestion that Mr. Xi and his family faced personal peril, said Mr. Xiao, the Chinese media expert. The letter demands that Mr. Xi resign "out of concern for the party's endeavors, out of concern for the future of the country and its people, and also out of concern for the personal safety of you and your family."
前述研究中国媒体的专家萧强表示，最让中国官方不满的可能是，公开信流露出，习近平及其家人的人身安全可能会有危险。信中要求习近平"出于党的事业的考虑，是出于国家和民族前途的考虑，同样，也是出于你和你家人自身安全的考虑"辞职。
It was first published online by Canyu, or Participation, a Chinese-language website based in the United States that specializes in news about human rights cases and commentary critical of the Chinese Communist Party.
公开信最先由美国的中文网站"参与"发布在网上。该网站主要刊登有关人权案件的新闻，以及批评中共的评论文章。
Cai Chu, the chief editor at Canyu, said he and colleagues received the anonymous letter by email on March 3. Mr. Cai declined to describe the email address it came from, citing the need to protect the safety of those who submitted the letter.
参与网主编蔡楚表示，他和同事是3月3日在电子邮箱中收到这封匿名信的。蔡楚不愿说出发件人的电子邮箱地址，理由是需要保护发来这封信的人的安全。
"To judge from the contents of the open letter, it may be the work of an elderly gentleman," Mr. Cai said in emailed answers to questions. "Whether it was possibly written by old party members can only be guessed at, not determined."
"从公开信的内容分析，这可能出自一位老先生之手，"蔡楚在通过电子邮件接受采访时表示。"是否可能是老党员所写，则不能判断，只能猜测。"
"The investigators are probably trying to figure out what technological loophole allowed the letter to appear on Wujie, and they want to figure out if the loophole was deliberate," said Zhao Hui, a writer in southern China who uses the pen name Mo Zhixu. "I guess they suspect a conspiracy here."
"他们做调查的，我想大概是想搞清楚无界有没有什么技术漏洞所以信能出现，而且就要搞清楚是不是有人故意提供这个漏洞，"中国南方笔名为"莫之许"的作家赵晖说。"我估计他们怀疑这是一场阴谋。"
Mr. Cai said he received a new letter on Monday claiming to be a petition of 171 "loyal party members" urging Mr. Xi to quit. He said he chose not to publish that one.
蔡楚表示，他周一又收到了一封信，自称是171名"忠诚的共产党员"敦促习近平辞职的请愿信。他说自己选择不发表这封信。
He said: "As it was also anonymous, it lacks credibility."
他说："由于也是匿名信，缺乏公信力。"
储百亮(Chris Buckley)是《纽约时报》驻京记者。
翻译：纽约时报中文网
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