Remembering the Tiananmen Square massacre

TAIPEI, Taiwan—In front of a blown-up photo of Tiananmen Square, a few hundred people gathered on a muggy Taipei night to commemorate the 26th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre in China. Groups set up booths around Liberty Square in the capital of Taiwan, their names reading like a list of censored words in China—Friends of Uighurs, Falun Gong, Free Tibet, Taiwan independence.

Onstage, former Tiananmen student leaders Wu’er Kaixi and Wang Dan urged attendees not to forget events of that fateful day, when the People’s Liberation Army turned its tanks and guns toward peacefully protesting students, killing hundreds. To the people of Taiwan,

June 4 revealed China’s true view of democracy, even as it promised to allow Taiwan its own political system under an “one country, two systems” reunification. Neither Wu nor Wang are allowed to return to their homeland, where mention of June 4 is strictly forbidden.

In China, the government commemorated the date in typical fashion—arresting activists, lawyers, and pastors; censoring any mention of June 4, 1989 from social media; and repeating its defense that the government acted appropriately to contain the “counterrevolutionary incident.” Chinese citizens found they were unable to make money transfers with amounts that include the numbers 64 or 89, according to The Wall Street Journal.

Yet as many young Chinese citizens move overseas for college, some are discovering the history of their own country for the first time. On May 20, Gu Yi, a University of Georgia student from China, wrote a open letter to his peers back home, detailing the Tiananmen Square massacre and calling for China to admit to the event and try those involved in the crackdown. Ten other Chinese students studying abroad also signed the letter.

That might have been the end of it, except that the government-controlled Global Times wrote a commentary blasting the students for “twisting facts” and claiming they had been “brainwashed in foreign countries.” Within days, hundreds of people added their names to the letter, including one high school student in mainland China who used his real name. The government quickly deleted the commentary.

While Gu has concerns about what will happen when he returns to China after his studies, “You can’t let the fear make decisions for you; otherwise you will live in fear all your life,” he told Asia Society website.

Others who have spoken out, or even dared to remember the event, have been taken into custody. Authorities arrested activist Chen Yunfei in March for commemorating the killing of two student protesters, and human rights lawyer Pu Zhiqiang was detained more than a year ago for attending a private seminar on the Tiananmen massacre. On June 4 this year, Pastor Wang Yi of Chengdu’s Early Rain Church, one of the most outspoken house churches in China, and two other church leaders, were taken from their homes in the morning for planning a prayer meeting for the nation. They were released later that night, but only after church members changed the location of their prayer meeting, and government officials confiscated stacks of books from the church.

The Tiananmen Mothers, an activist group made up of relatives of those killed in Tiananmen, also released an open letter last week through U.S.-based Human Rights in China, calling on the country’s top leadership to admit to the crimes done to their loved ones. In the letter, they said in the same way China requires Japan to own up to its wartime atrocities, it should own up to its own historical baggage—the Great Leap Forward, the Cultural Revolution, and the Tiananmen Square massacre.

“By the same logic, shouldn’t today’s Chinese leaders bear responsibility for the series of crimes—manmade famine and slaughter—perpetrated in their own country by China’s leaders at the time: Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping?” the group asked.

Reporter June Cheng in China contributed to this report.