Petitions office in China to accept complaints online
Critics fear accepting online complaints will make it easier to track petitioners rather than improve the handling of public's grievances
The state body that vets public grievances has launched a website to take complaints about all abuses of administrative power, a move intended to help ease the crush of petitioners who flood into the capital.
The website run by the State Bureau of Letters and Calls allows citizens to file complaints without making a costly and long trip to Beijing - where they are often intercepted by their local governments and detained.
But some rights lawyers and petitioners questioned whether such online complaints would receive the requisite level of attention.
"Their problems cannot be solved even through face-to-face dialogue, so I'm not optimistic about the function of the website," said Yuan Yulai , a prominent rights lawyer. "Their problems would be much more easily fixed if the country had a legal system that could earn the people's trust."
I'm not optimistic about the function of the website. Their problems would be much more easily fixed if the country had a legal system that could earn the people's trust
The website was nevertheless overwhelmed by visitors yesterday and was down for part of the morning, state media said.