Hong Kong marks Tiananmen massacre for what many fear will be the last time
Source: CNN
Hong Kong (CNN)When protests broke out in Beijing and other cities across China in early 1989, many in Hong Kong were exhilarated.
"It was a time of hope," said Lee Cheuk-yan, a veteran activist and former Hong Kong lawmaker. At that time, the city was eight years out from being handed over from British to Chinese control, and there was a sense that the young protesters across the border could be changing China for the better.
"For many Hong Kongers, we felt that 1997 was really hanging over our heads. But young people in China were demanding democracy, and we thought if they make it, it means Hong Kong will not have to live under an authoritarian regime."
That hope became despair, however, as the People's Liberation Army crushed the protests on June 4. No official death toll has ever been released, but rights groups estimate hundreds, if not thousands were killed. The Tiananmen protests and the crackdown have been wiped from the history books in China, censored and controlled, organizers exiled or arrested, and the relatives of those who died kept under tight surveillance.
Read more: https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/03/asia/hong-kong-tiananmen-june-4-china-intl-hnk/index.html
Trump is a public relations gift to China on the eve of the anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre. In better days, we might have a President who would acknowdege the courage of protesters fighting for freedom, democracry and self-expression. Today, we have a President doing his best to emulate the crackdown.
Jamastiene
(38,187 posts)Trump would tweet for them to go ahead and run over the protester....if it comes to that here in America. And it might.
TomCADem
(17,378 posts)When you think of Trump insisting that no tear gas was used to clear out protesters along with his threats of violence, it is not like this has not happened before...
Politicub
(12,163 posts)Trump is among them.
TomVilmer
(1,832 posts)https://archives.cjr.org/behind_the_news/the_myth_of_tiananmen.php
- Tiananmen Crackdown: Student's Account Questioned on Major Points.
https://www.nytimes.com/1989/06/13/world/turmoil-china-tiananmen-crackdown-student-s-account-questioned-major-points.html
TomCADem
(17,378 posts)&has_verified=1
TomVilmer
(1,832 posts)... but if you read the reports from Western journalists, who was actually there, there is another story.
All agree that the Chines government is brutal against any kind of protests with little regard for human life. The difference of these reports is, that the students on the Tiananmen Square left without violence. And there were fights in surrounding areas, where an unknown number of hundreds of mainly workers was killed.
There are no evidence of the official Western story. No film, no photos - no satellite images. No tanks rolling over the students. The well known images is from other parts of town
So no troops beating and machine-gunning unarmed students clustered around the Monument to the People's Heroes in the middle of Tiananmen Square. That is the myth. But lots of bloody police violence in other parts of the city, and lots of workers got killed that night.
This is also confirmed in the secret cables from the United States embassy in Beijing: "Once agreement was reached for the students to withdraw, linking hands to form a column, the students left the square through the south east corner."