Workers fled China's world's largest iPhone factory.

Workers fled China's world's largest iPhone factory this weekend as a coronavirus outbreak spread and authorities imposed quarantine restrictions.

The Foxconn plant in the city of Zhengzhou is the latest manufacturing centre to be hobbled by President Xi Jinping's strict zero-Covid policies. Workers said the plant area had been locked down for days, with public transport closed and many roads blocked. «It was chaos in the dormitories,» said a 22-year-old worker surnamed Xia. « My elder sister is locked in her dorm room,» said Cao Zhiqiang, an assembly line worker.

«My home is too far to run to, so I'm stuck here». According to a think-tank linked to China's commerce ministry, tens of thousands of workers usually live at the plant, which shipped $32bn worth of electronics abroad in 2019. It has long drawn young workers from villages throughout the Henan region, with local officials helping to recruit them. Yesterday authorities scrambled to organise buses to take workers home and into centralised quarantine after social media were flooded with scenes of people tramping down the highway.

Hundreds of workers registered in social media groups to share rides home. «I will never go back to Foxconn,» said a worker surnamed Xu, who escaped the plant at 2 am yesterday.

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