The machines are all ready to go. But the lights are out at Specialty Medical Supplies, a small American company that has been making alcohol swabs and plastic parts in Qiaozi, a sleepy town at the foothills just north of Beijing, for 10 years, writes Kathrin Hille in Beijing.
Production has been halted as workers are guarding Chip Starnes, their boss. Since Friday, he has been a prisoner of his staff, who accuse him of owing wages and fear he will default.
In the same paisley-patterned blue shirt he has worn since Friday, the 42-year-old looks overtired and nervous during a visit by invited media. “This is not right. If we had unfinished work on some order, I wouldn’t keep everybody at the machines until everything is done,” he says. “But they are saying I can’t leave unless we have an agreement.”