Today’s “rising China,” which from the outside can seem to exude strength and confidence, inwardly lives with an unsure view of itself. People sense, even if they do not want to talk about it, that their country’s current system is grounded partly in fraud, cannot be relied upon to treat people fairly, and might not hold up. Insecurity, the new national mood, extends from laid-off migrant laborers to the men at the top of the Communist Party. The socialist slogans that the government touts are widely seen as mere panoply that covers a lawless crony capitalism in which officials themselves are primary players. This incongruity has been in place for many years and no longer fools anyone. People take it as normal, but that very normality makes cynicism the public ideology. Many people turn to materialism—whether in property or investment—in search of value, but often cannot feel secure there, either; even if they gain a bit of wealth, they do not know when it might disappear or be wrested away.

One stopgap that top leaders have used has been to stoke national pride. They have staged an Olympics and a World’s Fair. They arrange to broadcast throughout China that the Dalai Lama is a “wolf” who would “split the motherland.” Such tactics have had some success. Chauvinist sentiment, especially among the upwardly mobile urban young, is easy to provoke, and is sometimes loudly expressed.

Yet in quieter settings, Chinese people continue to make decisions that reflect their lack of confidence in China’s future. Farmers from Fujian province still pay “snakeheads” tens of thousands of dollars to smuggle one person to Sydney, London, or New York. Of the approximately 145,000 Chinese students who go abroad each year for study, only about 25–30 percent return to live in China (and of these, some keep foreign passports tucked away). Even leaders of the Communist Party send their children—and large amounts of their money—to places like Vancouver and Los Angeles.

© Sophie Beach for China Digital Times (CDT), 2010. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: China's rise, Ding Zilin, famine, Liu Xiaobo, perry link, Yang Jisheng
Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

His portrait hangs on the living room wall, where he is forever smiling, sturdy – and 17.

His ashes are kept in a wooden cabinet just below.

On it, his father has inscribed: “In these short 17 years, you lived like a real man. Your humanitarian nobility and integrity will be kept in the undying memory of history. Your forever loving father and mother.”

It has been 20 years since high school student Jiang Jielian was shot dead during the Tiananmen Square massacre of June 1989.

His mother and father, Ding Zilin and Jiang Peikun, will never forget.

Nor will they let the Communist party forget.

© Liu Yong for China Digital Times (CDT), 2009. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: 1989 protests, Ding Zilin, tiananmen mothers
Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

Fifteen years ago my son Stephen was murdered. To lose one’s child is a devastating blow from which a mother can never fully recover. And to lose one’s child as a result of a violent attack – in the case of my son Stephen, a racist attack – leaves an even deeper wound. But it is the failure to get justice that stops that wound from ever truly healing.

Stephen was only 18 when his life was cut short on a south-east London street. Jiang Jielian was 17 when, on the night of 3 June 1989, he was shot through the heart by Chinese riot police on their way to Tiananmen Square in Beijing. Like Stephen, he was left to bleed to death. He was one of the first to be killed when troops “cleared” the pro-democracy protests.

Like me, his mother Ding Zilin wanted to know why her son had been murdered and who had taken the life of an unarmed teenager; and she wanted justice. In August 1989, she met another bereaved mother, Zhang Xianling. Others joined, and the group became the Tiananmen Mothers.

Read also “Tiananmen Mothers” Publish Maps Including Locations of June Fourth Victims’ Deaths from Human Rights in China.

© Liu Yong for China Digital Times (CDT), 2008. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: 1989 protests, Ding Zilin, tiananmen mothers
Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

Mothers of those killed in China’s 1989 crackdown on pro-democracy protests have joined the list of groups invoking this summer’s Beijing Olympics to draw attention to their causes.

In an open letter released Thursday, the Tiananmen Mothers warned the Games would be dogged by lingering guilt and mistrust unless China confronts the truth about the crackdown.

“Is it really possible that, as the host of the 2008 Olympic Games, the government can be at ease allowing athletes from all over the world to tread on this piece of bloodstained soil and participate in the Olympics?” the letter said.

© Xiao Qiang for China Digital Times (CDT), 2008. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Ding Zilin, June 4th, tiananmen mothers
Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

On Wednesday, China celebrated the beginning of its one-year countdown to the Beijing Olympics. Festivities and fireworks animated Tiananmen Square, a gathering place known also for its bloody memories. A band onstage guided the crowd through the proud new Beijing pop anthem “We Are Ready.”

Human rights activists, with less pomp but considerable courage, also observed the Olympics pre-anniversary.

On Tuesday, 40 well-known scholars, lawyers and writers released an open letter to Chinese and world leaders. The letter expressed, respectfully, deep concerns over China’s human rights policies, particularly in light of the Beijing Olympic Committee’s stated objectives of hosting an open, green, and humane Olympics. [Full Text]

Read also “One World, One Dream” and Universal Human Rights: An Open Letter to Chinese and World Leaders on the 2008 Beijing Olympics from Chinese Human Rights Defenders:

(...)
Read the rest of ‘One World, One Dream’ – Washington Post editorial (1,927 words)

© Liu Yong for China Digital Times (CDT), 2007. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: activists, Beijing 2008 Olympics, Ding Zilin, jiang peikun, Olympics human rights
Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall

The Tiananmen Square killings of 3-4 June 1989 remain the most sensitive political issue in China and the Chinese government never lets the population forget it. According to Amnesty International, at least 200 Tiananmen demonstrators detained in June 1989 remain behind bars, and even to mention the name “Tiananmen” on China’s tightly censored internet can bring a knock on the door from the police.

The Tiananmen Mothers are, therefore, among the bravest and most tenacious women in China. Formed immediately after the 1989 killings and the uprisings in 400 other Chinese cities, the 126 surviving members of this campaigning group are regularly detained and threatened, and are removed from Beijing whenever foreign statesmen concerned with human rights are visiting. [Full Text]

See also Tiananmen Mothers Roundtable Calls for Official Accountability by Human Rights in China:

(...)
Read the rest of China’s Gaping Wound – Jonathan Mirsky (158 words)

© Liu Yong for China Digital Times (CDT), 2007. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Ding Zilin, June 4th, tiananmen mothers
Download Tools to Circumvent the Great Firewall