From Associated Press:
China’s leadership collectively decided to crack down on the Tiananmen Square pro-democracy protests in 1989, the oldest daughter of late Chinese supreme leader Deng Xiaoping said Sunday.
The daughter, Deng Lin, said that crushing the demonstrations in Beijing was the right thing to do because China would have been thrown into chaos if the protesters were allowed to decide the nation’s fate. China watchers have long debated about who decided to order the troops and tanks to break up the seven-week protest on June 4, 1989, killing hundreds – perhaps thousands – of people.
The Tiananman crackdown continues to be an extremely sensitive issue in China, and the highly secretive government and Communist Party has yet to provide a full account of who was involved in the decision to send in the troops. Many of the leaders suspected of being involved have retired or died. Deng Lin said in an interview on Hong Kong’s government-run RTHK radio, “It was the leadership that made a collective decision. You shouldn’t say that one person was responsible for it.” [Full Text]
