June, 5th 1989, a chinese man blocked the march of the tanks by standing up in front of them near Tiananmen square. This picture made the world tour and if this day you were in front of your TV watching the news like me, it should bring you some souvenirs. I remembered that the man moved on his right side when the tank moved to its left side and to his left side, when it moved to its right side. Always standing in front of them and making them stop their march to fight against students and people who were protesting against their communist government. 20 years have passed since this picture has been |
taken and even now, we don’t know exactly who was the man and what happened to him after that the police pulled him aside for the tanks to keep moving.
This year 2009 is the 20th anniversary to commemorate and to remind the people to not forget about all those students and people killed by the army to fight for their democracy.
This event is known as the june fourth incident in order to avoid any confusions with the previous protests on Tiananmen square. You may hear about this protest with a more shocking name “Tiananmen square massacre”.
About the tank man, his identity is still unidentified but in 1989, the newspaper “Sunday Express” said that the man was Wang Weilin, a 19 year old student but not confirmed.
Moreover, they published that he was charged with "political hooliganism" and "attempting to subvert members of the People's Liberation Army" but this story was something confused since other sources said that he was executed by the police or still alive somewhere in China.
Same thing for the massacre, some sources said that 2600 people was killed by the army and the official Chinese government said 241 dead (including soldiers) and 7000 wounded.
Like you can guess, the government has put a lot of measures to prevent any commemoration since some months, more during this month and mucho more today and next coming days. Indeed, if you use the Chinese version of yahoo or google and make a search, you will find nothing about it but also twitter, blogger, flickr, wordpress, hotmail… Not only internet but also traditional medias have been blocked.
Just to let know or to remind all of us, the protest had gathered more or less 100000 people on the square in order of mourning the death of Hu Yaobang (by a heart attack), leader of the People's Republic of China.
Famous political man who was forced to resign his function and humiliated by other political men because he wanted to make a very big change in his country toward capitalism and political reform from communism to democracy.
Like you can guess, majority of the protestants adhered his ideas and the manifestation also was a way to claim this change which ended by a massacre resulting from the military response.
So this article is a tribute not only for those people who were killed but also for everyone who lives in a communist country and who still fights for a democratic world.
June 5, 2009
| Previous | Copyright © World-RT.com | Next |
Your comment