Security tight in Beijing on anniversary of 1989 crackdown
ASSOCIATED PRESS
A pair of late-arriving visitors run to watch the daily flag-raising ceremony at dawn at Tiananmen Square in Beijing, Saturday, June 4, 2016. Saturday marks the 27th anniversary of Chinas bloody crackdown on pro-democracy protests centered on Beijings Tiananmen Square.
BEIJING >> China tightened security around Beijing’s Tiananmen Square on Saturday on the 27th anniversary of the bloody military crackdown on student-led pro-democracy protests, pointing to the enduring sensitivity over the events among the Communist Party leadership.
Police checked IDs and searched the bags of anyone seeking to enter the environs of the vast public space in the center of the capital where thousands of students, workers and ordinary citizens gathered in 1989 to demand political reforms. Journalists from The Associated Press were stopped, filmed and ultimately forced to leave the area, ostensibly for lacking proper permission.
Hundreds, possibly thousands, of people were killed as tanks and troops converged on Beijing on the night of June 3-4, 1989. The topic remains taboo in China and any form of commemoration, whether public or private, is banned.
Memorials were planned in the semi-autonomous Chinese territory of Hong Kong and on the self-governing island democracy of Taiwan, where some former student leaders have found refuge.
The Taiwanese Cabinet office responsible for ties with China issued a statement urging Beijing to “face up and heal the historical scars of June 4.”
“We look forward to the Chinese mainland reevaluating the history of June 4, valuing the will of the people and creating a fair, just and harmonious society through the building of institutions,” the Mainland Affairs Council said in a news release.
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Ahead of the anniversary, family members of those killed in the crackdown were placed under additional restrictions, either confined to their homes or forced to leave the capital. China’s government has rejected their calls for an independent accounting of the events and those killed and maimed by soldiers.
At least half a dozen people have reportedly been detained in recent days for attempting to commemorate the events, although a small group wearing T-shirts condemning the crackdown converged on the square last Sunday. Among them was former house painter Qi Zhiyong, whose leg was amputated after he was shot by troops.
In Washington, the U.S. State Department called for a “full public accounting of those killed, detained, or missing and for an end to censorship of discussions about the events of June 4, 1989, as well as an end to harassment and detention of those who wish to peacefully commemorate the anniversary.”
In a statement, it also urged the Chinese government to respect the rights and freedoms of all its citizens.
Asked Friday about the anniversary, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said China had “long ago reached a clear conclusion about the political turmoil at the end of 1980s and other related issues.”
China’s explosive economic growth in the years that followed “proves that the path of socialism with Chinese characters we chose to follow … is in line with the fundamental interests of the Chinese people, and it represents a wish shared by them all,” Hua told reporters at a daily news briefing.
4 responses to “Security tight in Beijing on anniversary of 1989 crackdown”
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China remains an undemocratic, closed, and repressive society, despite its relatively recent but very mild economic reforms. The only positive resulting from the murderous “Cultural Revolution” that lasted into the mid 70s and the Tiananmen Square crackdown was the mass exodus of highly motivated and talented people emigrating to the West, Hawaii included.
It’s alarming that the left in this country seems comfortable using some of the same thuggish tactics in suppressing free speech, especially on college campuses and during political rallies, and personal freedom.
Let’s not forget that Maoism holds that the essence of communism is revolution. Mao demonstrated that with his cultural revolution. Today’s Chinese state is using the party as state control of counter revolutionary institutions. The very institutions that are not communist at all, except insofar as the Party controls them through the cadre the same way the cadre during the revolutionary periods decided who got some food and who did not and died. Dissolve the party and hold elections is both Democratic and counter-revolutionary.
Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.
Let’s remember the time that Trump praised China for its brutal suppression of the pro-democracy demonstrators (he called them “rioters”): “When the students poured into Tiananmen Square, the Chinese government almost blew it. Then they were vicious, they were horrible, but they put it down with strength. That shows you the power of strength. Our country is right now perceived as weak… as being spit on by the rest of the world.”