Tiananmen Bloodshed Not Forgotten

After 20 years, the Tiananmen Square crackdown of June 4th has faded out of memory for some. But those directly affected refuse to forget the horror. We now hear from people who remember June 4th like it was yesterday.

As the sun rises over Beijing’s Tiananmen Square this Thursday, many will recall the events that took place here on June 4, 1989.

In the early hours of that fateful day, the army opened fire on a student-led pro-democracy demonstration – one of the many that had sprung up across the country for weeks.

The Chinese Red Cross and student associations estimate the death toll to have been at least 2,000, a figure generally believed to be conservative.

Qi Zhiyong was a 33-year-old construction worker in 1989 when he joined protests in Beijing. He was shot on Chang’an Avenue near the square when troops opened fire on demonstrators in the early hours of the morning… Qi’s leg had to be amputated.

20 years later, Qi is undergoing treatment for high blood pressure and diabetes which he attributes to his handicap.

[Qi Zhiyong, Tiananmen Massacre Survivor]:
„What that gun did to me was make me understand the value of my existence. I understood better what kind of country I was in, and how my government treated me. In the last 20 years what I have felt and experienced has been hardship.“

But many hit by flying bullets were less fortunate than Qi.

Zhang Xianling’s son was killed by army fire. Wang Nan was a cheerful 19-year-old when he left a note on the night of June 3 to say he was going to join friends on the square.

Zhang founded the Tiananmen Mothers group with another woman, Ding Zilin, whose 17-year-old son was also killed.

The group is trying to make a list of the dead as well as overturning the verdict that the movement was a “counter-revolutionary” plot.

[Zhang Xianling, Co-Founder, “Tiananmen Mothers”]:
„In the last 20 years my view of the Tiananmen movement, of the June 4 student uprising, has not changed at all. Because the students were fighting against corruption and absolute Party control. The last 20 years have proved that they were absolutely right.“

Most student leaders were able to flee mainland China after the crackdown, pursuing new lives abroad.

Bao Tong was a top aid to former Communist Party chief Zhao Ziyang, who sympathized with student protesters and was placed under house arrest until his death in 2005.

[Bao Tong, Zhao Ziyang’s Aid]:
„If China’s economy has prospered because of suppression, then I invite the Chinese government to share their experience with the rest of the world, and tell the world that if you want your economy to prosper all you have to do is send tanks and machine guns into your capital and turn them on your people.”

Many still hold hope that one day the Tiananmen crackdown will no longer be a taboo in the world’s most populous country.

But twenty years after reports of the massacre shocked the world, the voices of Tiananmen are still unlikely to be heard inside their own country.

(NTDTV)