中国出稼ぎ労働者の過酷な生活、コロナ行動履歴で明らかに

【ＡＦＰ＝時事】中国の出稼ぎ労働者ユエさん（４４）は今週、新型コロナウイルスに感染し行動履歴から過酷な生活が明らかになり、捜していた行方不明の息子（２１）が亡くなっていたことも分かり同情を集めた。（写真は資料写真）
　中国は感染者ゼロを目指す「ゼロコロナ」政策を掲げており、濃厚接触者を追跡しやすくするために詳細を伏せた上で感染者の移動歴を公表している。
　ユエさんは、北京市が発表した新型ウイルス感染者リストに含まれていた。
　ユエさんの息子は２０２０年８月、東部・山東省で行方不明となった。ユエさんは昨年、息子がかつて調理師として働いていた北京を訪れた。
　息子が行方不明になったとされる地域を管轄する威海市の警察は２１日、２０２０年８月に現地の貯水池で発見された「腐敗の激しい」遺体の身元が、ＤＮＡ鑑定でユエさんの息子と特定されたとソーシャルメディアで明らかにした。ユエさん夫婦はＤＮＡ鑑定の結果を受け入れず、裁判を起こしたという。
　多くのネットユーザーは、ユエさんと、変異株「オミクロン株」の北京初の感染者である銀行員の生活を比較した。地元当局が公開した移動歴によると、銀行員は高級ショッピングモールで買い物し、スキーに行っていた。
　一方のユエさんは、家族と親戚を養いながら息子を捜す資金をためるため、建設資材の運搬や雑用などを掛け持ちしていた。今月１日から１７日まで建設現場など２０か所前後で、しばしば深夜まで働き、外食は一度きりという中国に数億人いる出稼ぎ労働者に典型的な生活を送っていた。
　ユエさんについて、「接触者追跡情報で見つかった最も勤勉な中国人」というハッシュタグを付けた投稿が多数見られたが、２１日には検閲制度によって検索できなくなった。ユエさんに関する一部の報道も検閲され、ソーシャルメディア上で共有できなくなった。【翻訳編集ＡＦＰＢＢＮｅｗｓ】
〔ＡＦＰ＝時事〕（2022/01/24-12:59）

The story of a Chinese migrant worker whose plight sparked a wave of online sympathy after he tested positive for the coronavirus took another sad twist Friday, as police said his missing son was long dead.
The 44-year-old labourer surnamed Yue became one of China's most talked-about topics this week after he was found to be among a handful of new coronavirus cases in Beijing.
As part of its zero-Covid strategy, China publishes anonymised details of where coronavirus carriers have been, in a bid to help with contact tracing.
Yue's itinerary exposed a harsh life of working dozens of odd jobs, hauling construction materials often late at night, to support his extended family and help finance searches for a missing son.
Yue said his 21-year-old son Yue Yuetong was reported missing in eastern Shandong province in August 2020 and that he had filed a petition to higher-level authorities.
Police in the city of Weihai, which falls under the jurisdiction where the son was reported missing, said on social media on Friday that a severely decomposed corpse found in a local reservoir in August 2020 was identified via DNA.
(The) public security bureau conducted DNA identification using blood samples taken from Yue and his wife... which confirmed it was Yue's son, but the couple did not accept the DNA identification results, the police statement said, adding the couple had since launched legal action.
Former fisherman Yue said he went to Beijing last year because his son had once worked there as a chef, after taking a variety of odd jobs in various provinces in the meantime.
The hashtag the hardest-working Chinese person found by contact tracers gained millions of views on social media before it was deactivated Friday.
China's censorship system also limited sharing of some news reports about Yue on social media.
Many online commenters contrasted Yue's plight with the lifestyle of Beijing's first Omicron patient, a bank employee who shopped at luxury malls and went skiing, according to an itinerary disclosed by local authorities.
Yue visited two dozen locations including construction sites for work from January 1 to January 17, often late at night, and ate out only once -- a typical lifestyle for China's hundreds of millions of migrant workers.
Beijing is battling a fresh Covid outbreak just days before the start of the Winter Olympics, reporting six new locally transmitted cases over the past week.