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[The Local Dialect]

From May 15th until the end of August, Beijng is going to be clearing the city of illegal foreigners. Expect random visa checks, so keep your passport on you. If you're doing part time work at a mill, this also might be a good time to take a small vacation.

This is no doubt due to the stir raised by the Englishman caught on tape attempting to take advantage of a Chinese woman, as well as several other prolific news cases involving foreigners in the past few weeks.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/society/2012-05/14/c_111949406.htm

[Fozzwaldus]

Bejing welcomes you!

[dragonsaver]

I would imagine that this type of purge may also be seen in other large cities in China.

I think we should all be extra careful this summer. 

[El Macho]

Thanks for that, and has there been any more information on that British guy/scumbag? (I believe in due process.)

[kitano]

My girlfriend told me not to wear my striped trackies because the guy looked like me and was wearing striped trackies

[Raoul F. Duke]

Remember too that this threat is present ALL THE TIME! There will be periodic sweeps like this from time to time, but any chance encounter with the police  can quickly turn into a problem if you don't have legal papers.

There's just no excuse for being in China without the right papers. Be legal or be gone!

[El Macho]

Here's an English version of the article:

BEIJING is to begin a clampdown on foreigners illegally entering, residing or working in the national capital to improve the city's security, according to a local authority announcement yesterday.

The campaign is set to start today and run to the end of August, said a spokesman with the Beijing Municipal Public Security Bureau.

Police will comb communities thought to have large numbers of such aliens and mobilize the public to report them, as well as tighten reviews of visa applications.

Official data shows that nearly 200,000 foreigners are in Beijing every day, including 120,000 inhabitants. Police records also show that foreigners without income, a home and a job are more likely to commit illegal acts in the city.

Beijing police reported earlier that a British man was detained on suspicion of assaulting a Chinese woman along a road in Xuanwumen in downtown Beijing's Xicheng District last Tuesday.

The man, intoxicated on the night of the incident, is a British national in China with a tourist visa. A video recording of the incident uploaded to the video-sharing site youku.com by an Internet user incurred outraged comments from many of those who saw it.

[The Local Dialect]

In the Chinese version there is actually a hotline where concerned locals can report suspicious foreigners. I really dislike the atmosphere of distrust between foreigners and locals that the authorities are trying to promote here.

Of course if you're here legally, minding your business and staying on the right side of the law, you don't really have anything to worry about except perhaps the added hassle of a trip to the police station if you happen to be wandering around town without your papers. Still, it isn't a nice feeling knowing there's an actual campaign against us targetting us as undesireables.

[El Macho]

I'm thinking of calling the hotline to "report" Chinese who look suspiciously like foreigners.

[MK]

Anti-foreigner nationalist sentiment being drummed up at a time of potential instability or crisis?  Seems familiar...

...[one comment] honed in on, and lauded, the dangerous semantics employed by Beijing police: “ ‘Clean up’ …This is really the right word to use. I feel like it’s cleaning up trash from the street.”

Others piled on, in many cases disregarding the original distinction between illegal foreigners and legal foreigners...SANGER opined, “White-skinned pigs , black devils, sticks [a slur referring to Koreans], devils, Southeast Asian monkeys and other kinds of foreign trash should all be swept out the door.”

http://tealeafnation.com/2012/05/chinese-netizens-say-time-to-clean-up-foreign-trash/

Yeah, there are racist  and nationalistic idiots in every country, but seriously, try not to let yourself become a target.

[Nolefan]

This is a periodic sweep, nothing special about it. IMHO, it's a way to divert the attention from other affairs happening in the country right now and will target mostly people working under false pretenses.... namely members of the media!
You'd be surprised at the number of them running around Beijing without proper credentials so I expect those to be target #1.

[The Local Dialect]

Anti-foreigner nationalist sentiment being drummed up at a time of potential instability or crisis?  Seems familiar...

...[one comment] honed in on, and lauded, the dangerous semantics employed by Beijing police: “ ‘Clean up’ …This is really the right word to use. I feel like it’s cleaning up trash from the street.”

Others piled on, in many cases disregarding the original distinction between illegal foreigners and legal foreigners...SANGER opined, “White-skinned pigs , black devils, sticks [a slur referring to Koreans], devils, Southeast Asian monkeys and other kinds of foreign trash should all be swept out the door.”

http://tealeafnation.com/2012/05/chinese-netizens-say-time-to-clean-up-foreign-trash/

Yeah, there are racist  and nationalistic idiots in every country, but seriously, try not to let yourself become a target.

 I find this very disturbing. The language used against foreigners on the internet is absolutely racist and xenophobic, and the government seems to be encouraging it by using inflammatory language themselves.

Of course I think it has everything to do with the current political situation, but I don't think this sweep is really routine. I've been here a long time and I've never heard before of hotline to report foreigners or heard the officials use words like "clean up" or other official slogan type language（三非） regarding routine visa checks.

I'm not so much worried about the police, but I do worry about friends (including Saloonies) out at the clubs and such. It feels like there are people out there itching for a chance to put us in our proper place. The whole thing just makes me uneasy in a way I've never before felt in China. Maybe that's because I have kids to think about now. Sigh.

[Nolefan]

Of course I think it has everything to do with the current political situation, but I don't think this sweep is really routine. I've been here a long time and I've never heard before of hotline to report foreigners or heard the officials use words like "clean up" or other official slogan type language（三非） regarding routine visa checks.

I'm not so much worried about the police, but I do worry about friends (including Saloonies) out at the clubs and such. It feels like there are people out there itching for a chance to put us in our proper place. The whole thing just makes me uneasy in a way I've never before felt in China. Maybe that's because I have kids to think about now. Sigh.

LD, I think you're unto something!

In the sanlitun area, that resentment has been around for a long time! Drunken fights between locals and laowai usually degenerate rather quickly into racial affairs. It's nothing new in here! That's one of the reasons i avoid that side of town like the plague.

Another thing to maybe consider is that we've had a string of similar weibo/tudou posts showcasing laowais doing a lot of good things that made locals quite ashamed and had them talking about lack of moral fiber in their society. Now, they get a chance to slam back.

At the end of the day, it's a good distraction for the mass populis from current affairs and takes the spotlight off of zhongnanhai for a while.

[Fozzwaldus]

Another thing to maybe consider is that we've had a string of similar weibo/tudou posts showcasing laowais doing a lot of good things that made locals quite ashamed and had them talking about lack of moral fiber in their society. Now, they get a chance to slam back.

yeah, I've heard this theory...
I think the fact that it's been allowed to spread so far is, as you say, they need a distraction, and nationalist fervour does very well. Methinks the whole thing with the Phillipines is something similar.

[Fozzwaldus]

I like the following comments from the link that MK posted...

Ulywang
If you have been in China that long and know the people so well, you should also know those rabid comments online don’t have much real bearing on the thoughts and behavior of those Chinese around you. It’s easy to cry wolf in situations like this anywhere in the world, but an outrageous case like the Brit brute and angry online voices rarely translate into a nationwide xenophobic trend. Again, you should already know that.

+

Don’t you “China watchers”ever get tired trying to read and make sense of all those Chinese netizens’ online comments? Yeah it’s a reflection of what “the people” think and how they may one day act, blahblah, but if you haven’t got the sense by now that these are mostly just a bunch of frustrated, bored young people blowing off steam and moaning for nothing, then there is something wrong with your China watching methodology.
How many times have they REALLY, I mean really, influenced Chinese policy making?

there's a lot of truth in what she says, methinks.

That said, it's ALWAYS good to be on good behaviour when out on the piss.