Thread by @KongTsungGan

With the 30th anniversary of the #June4 #TiananmenMassacre now 2 weeks away, today I start featuring profiles of #CCP murder victims from @hrichina's excellent 'Unforgotten'. I also change my profile pic to #DuanChanglong & encourage others to do likewise. truth30.hrichina.org/unforgotten.ht…

#HK journalists have made a new series of dozens of short video testimonies (w English sub-titles) about their coverage of the 1989 pro-democracy protests in China 30 years ago to commemorate #June4. #六四30 youtube.com/channel/UCaSjK…

The book to read for the 30th anniversary of the #June4 #TiananmenMassacre is @liaoyiwu1's Bullets & Opium about the ordinary people imprisoned in the crackdown's aftermath. Here's an excerpt. #六四30 qz.com/1593708/bullet…

Apart from not knowing how many people were killed and seriously injured on #June4, 1989 (probably in the tens of thosuands), we don't know either how many were executed and given lengthy prison terms in the aftermath. The #CCP's cloak of enforced amnesia & secrecy is suffocating

I've written 2 #June4 essays in recent years, 1 about the central role June 4 plays in how global history has played out in recent decades (bit.ly/2HtqM0G) & another about June 4 & the need for solidarity among all opponents of #CCP dictatorship bit.ly/2JU7F1E

My new profile pic & today's featured #CCP murder victim is #DuanChanglong. Duan was a student at Qinghua University. He stepped forward from a crowd to try to mediate between the advancing army & citizens & was shot at close range by a soldier. #June4 truth30.hrichina.org/duan_changlong…

Inflatable installation of #TankMan appears outside Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall in Taiwan, baffling Chinese tourists. It's part of #June4 International Symposium from 18 May to June 4, including many #TiananmenMassacre survivors barred from entering #HK. rfa.org/english/news/c…

#CCP #June4 murder victim #SuXin, 29yo employee of state-owned company. She was worried about her mother & went to visit her. On the way, she was shot in the chest by martial law troops firing into a crowd with submachine guns. #六四30 #TiananmenMassacre truth30.hrichina.org/su_xin.html

#CCP murder victim #WuXiangdong (吴向东), factory worker & night student, active participant in 1989 democracy movement, shot in the neck while walking his girlfriend home. #June4 #六四30 Read his last testament, written the day martial law was declared: truth30.hrichina.org/wu_xiangdong.h…

Guo Wenqian's eyewitness account of the #June4 1989 #TiananmenMassacre, a turning point in his own life and in Chinese history. #六四30 hrichina.org/en/china-right…

This Sunday, May 26
#HK's annual #June4 march, this year to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the #TiananmenMassacre
3pm, Southorn Playground in Wanchai to the Liaison Office #六四30

The official announcement of the #June4 candlelight vigil has just been posted. 8pm, Victoria Park.
I hope everyone in #HK that day attends.
HK today is just a bullet away from Beijing in '89. #TiananmenMassacre #六四30

Taiwan president @iingwen meets #June4 #TiananmenMassacre survivors, in Taiwan for a symposium on the 30th anniversary of the 1989 democracy movement, the last time it looked like freedom might come to China. @fangzheng1989 @ZhouFengSuo @tengbiao rfa.org/english/news/v…

Special kudos to @tengbiao for asking @iingwen 'to make a strong statement condemning the mass incarceration of Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in the northwestern region of Xinjiang, something that her aides had said they would discuss privately.'

@tengbiao @iingwen #CCP murder victim #MaChengfen (马承芬), 55yo demobilized soldier. She was sitting on the front steps of her home when martial law troops, 200m away, fired into the area. She was shot in the lower right abdomen & died hours later. #June4 #TiananmenMassacre truth30.hrichina.org/ma_chengfen.ht…

To my knowledge, this is the 1st #June4 #TiananmenMassacre arrest this year. Ironically, it is for posting a photo of a liquor bottle made by four men in 2016 who spent over 2yrs in detention without trial for that ‘crime’. Hope it’s not the start of more. hongkongfp.com/2019/05/24/chi…

#CCP murder victim #YanWen (严文), 23, university student, active participant in '89 Democracy Movement. At 1am on #June4, while taking photos of the crackdown, he was shot in the artery of his upper right leg & bled to death. #TiananmenMassacre #六四30 truth30.hrichina.org/yan_wen.html

#CCP murder victim #ZhangJin (张瑾), 19. After midnight on #June4, she was returning home w a friend. They encountered martial law troops & hid but soldiers chased them down & sprayed them w bullets. Zhang was shot in the head. #TiananmenMassacre #六四30 truth30.hrichina.org/zhang_jin.html

Understandably, much coverage of the #June4 #TiananmenMassacre focuses on the #CCP murder victims. Today, we still don't know how many were killed. Estimates range from about 200 to over 10,000. The army killed people not only in Beijing but also in other places, such as Chengdu.

Estimates of those seriously injured in the crackdown also range widely, up to 40,000. The overall picture is incomplete and fragmentary. The #CCP has never allowed an independent and impartial investigation; in fact, just the opposite: It’s done everything it can to cover up.

Compared to those murdered & seriously injured, those who received lengthy prison sentences have gotten less attention. A large number of students were imprisoned. Typical prison sentences for them were 2 to 3 years, with the longest, for student leader @wangdan1989, being 4 yrs.

Apart from the students imprisoned, thousands, perhaps tens of thousands, of ordinary people were given longer prison terms. They were classified by the #CCP as ‘rioters’. Some were executed not long after #June4.

Some were given death sentences suspended for 2 years, then commuted to life. Some were given life sentences, also often later commuted. The sentences for these ‘rioters’ appear to have ranged from 4 to 16 years, with 7-9 years being typical.

Little is known about them. In 1994, @hrichina & @hrw published a ground-breaking report documenting over 500 in prisons around Beijing alone. At that point, China was still denying there were any long-term prisoners at all. hrichina.org/sites/default/…

The story of how the information for that report was gathered and found its way to the outside world still cannot be told. From that report, it became clear that throughout China, the number of long-term prisoners had to be in the thousand and perhaps tens of thousands.

.@liaoyiwu1's Bullets and Opium, recently translated into English, puts some flesh and blood on these people, with interviews with some of these "#June4 rioters", mostly in Beijing and Sichuan. qz.com/1593708/bullet…

When we talk of the lives destroyed by the #CCP’s #June4 #TiananmenMassacre, this should include not only those murdered & seriously injured in the crackdown, but also those executed & those given long prison sentences.

The last known #June4 prisoner, Miao Deshun, was released in 2016. No one knows what happened to him after his release. He had reportedly been in very poor mental and physical health for years before then. sputniknews.com/asia/201610161…

All of this remains mostly buried history in the People’s Republic of Amnesia, as @limlouisa so aptly calls it, enforced by pervasive censorship & propaganda. In this, #June4 is like much of the rest of history under #CCP rule, a major reason it's been such a disaster for China.

That, & the fact that China is still an oppressive dictatorship run by the very same party that murdered its own people en masse in 1989, is why #June4 is still so relevant 30 years on. The world we see around us today is a result of what the #CCP did on that date.

Under round-the-clock surveillance & prohibited from gathering, some Tiananmen Mothers still manage to commemorate together the #June4 #TiananmenMassacre of their children.
Zhang Baocheng detained in Beijing, Ou Biaofeng taken on enforced vacation in Hunan rfa.org/english/news/c…

in 1989, Jiang Lin was an army journalist. Now, she's speaking out about the #June4 #TiananmenMassacre for the first time: generals opposed to martial law & soldiers shooting indiscriminately. “If you can deny that people were killed, any lie is possible.” nytimes.com/2019/05/28/wor…

#CCP murder victim #YaAiguo (轧爱国), 22, shot in the head by soldiers. His mother & brother are in Tiananmen Mothers. His father hanged himself in 2012 to protest the lack of redress for the injustice done to his son. #June4 #TiananmenMassacre #六四30 truth30.hrichina.org/ya_aiguo.html

In public speech rare in China (& censored from internet), young artist invokes #TiananmenMassacre: '"In particular on the 30th anniversary of #June4, 1989 I feel even more embarrassed to be standing so very close to Tiananmen Square accepting this award." rfa.org/english/news/c…

#CCP murder victim #WangNan, 19, shot by martial law troops at 1am on #June4. The soldiers prevented by-standers from evacuating him to a hospital & half-buried his body along w others. They were discovered days later after rain. #TiananmenMassacre #六四30 truth30.hrichina.org/wang_nan.html

On this day 30yrs ago, the Goddess of Democracy was erected in Tiananmen Square. Student declaration: “The spirit of democracy is what all people under dictatorial repression yearn for...you are the hope the Chinese nation can be saved...the soul of the 1989 democracy movement.”

The Goddess of Democracy would remain in Tiananmen Square for only 4 days, destroyed by martial law troops on #June4. Here are screenshots from CCTV propaganda footage & a #CCP photo of the statue's destruction. Read about the statue here: sinosphere.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/06/01/the…

.@ArthurKent releases new 13-min film 'Black Night in June' composed of footage he took on #June4 in Beijing 30 years ago while working there as a journalist, mostly on Chang'an Ave & Tiananmen Square. hongkongfp.com/2019/05/30/vid…

.@CHRDnet has documented cases of 10 people who have been detained or forcibly disappeared in connection to the 30th anniversary of the #June4 #TiananmenMassacre. nchrd.org/2019/05/suppre…

@CHRDnet Sun Liyong publishes (in Chinese) 'The #June4 Civil Resistance' telling the stories of 108 unsung heroes of 1989, ordinary citizens who defended students against the army & were killed or served long prison sentences, a mostly overlooked history up to now.
rfa.org/english/news/c…

@CHRDnet 'For authoritarian regimes like China’s, history is power, because their political systems are legitimized through myths.' @iandenisjohnson on @NewCenturyBaopu's new book about a secret #CCP meeting 2 weeks after #June4 that enforced the Party's verdict. nybooks.com/articles/2019/…

@CHRDnet @iandenisjohnson @NewCenturyBaopu Li Rui, an early #CCP member, lived in a building for high-ranking Party officials, from which he witnessed some of the most intense killing of the #June4 #TiananmenMassacre at Muxidi. This is his account, 'Black Weekend', from his diary. #六四30 nybooks.com/articles/2019/…

@CHRDnet @iandenisjohnson @NewCenturyBaopu #CCP murder victim #LiuFenggen, 40, factory worker, shot three times in the back & arms while rescuing others. At the hospital, doctors recognized him because he'd delivered many injured. Left a wife & 8yo daughter. #June4 #TiananmenMassacre #六四30 truth30.hrichina.org/liu_fenggen.ht…

@CHRDnet @iandenisjohnson @NewCenturyBaopu .@hrw statement '#TiananmenMassacre Injustice Fuels Repression 30 Years On' makes important point that while the last #June4 prisoner was released in 2016, many other 89ers, like #LiuXiaobo, were re-imprisoned. @64tianwang #HuangQi's in prison now. #六四30
hrw.org/news/2019/05/3…

@CHRDnet @iandenisjohnson @NewCenturyBaopu @hrw @64tianwang .@yangyang_cheng was born after the #June4 #TiananmenMassacre. This is her account of her 'journey in finding out what happened in the spring of 1989...a lesson in remembrance, both personal and political.' #六四30 chinafile.com/reporting-opin…

@CHRDnet @iandenisjohnson @NewCenturyBaopu @hrw @64tianwang @yangyang_cheng In 1989, Jian Liu took over 2,000 photos. In 2016, he moved to Los Angeles & now is publishing them for the first time, motivated by the realization his teenage daughter had never heard of the #June4 #TiananmenMassacre. “The #CCP is a govt based on lies.” nytimes.com/2019/05/30/wor…

.@majian53’s memories of 1989 & what it means today. ‘The crackdown lies at the heart of all that ails the country. Its corrosive and enduring message is: the party, national glory and GDP are more important than human life.’ theguardian.com/books/2019/may…

“In China, as well as #HK, people are always teetering between whether to resist or not. They choose to acquiesce all the time, but at some point, they realise they can’t take it anymore. But if you ask them to push back, by then it seems too late.” hongkongfp.com/2019/06/01/top…

1989 student leader @wangdan1989 on the lessons he learned from the demonstrations 30 years ago and how he sees the situation in China today. He spent almost seven years in prison and has lived in exile since 1998. #June4 #Tiananmen30 nytimes.com/2019/06/01/opi…

@wangdan1989 #TiananmenSquare, June 2, 1989, 30 years ago today. The crackdown was less than 48 hours away. #June4 #TiananmenMassacre #六四30

@wangdan1989 & this is how Victoria Park #HK looked in the evening of June 1, 2019. It takes 3 days to set up the #June4 candlelight vigil. The 30th anniversary vigil will be historic. Join us if you can.

https://twitter.com/KongTsungGan/status/1134857220485713920?s=20

And here’s the #GoddessOfDemocracy arriving in Victoria Park #HK late on June 1, 2019. The #CCP thought they’d destroyed it 30 years ago, but the desire for freedom and democracy is impossible to extinguish. #June4 #TiananmenMassacre

1989 student leader Feng Congde barred from entering #HK to attend #June4 candlelight vigil. #HK routinely denies entry to '89 leaders & those perceived by #CCP as enemies, refusing to comment & claiming it has no blacklist. Feng: 1country2systems is a lie news.rthk.hk/rthk/en/compon…

.@lilkuo reminds that it wasn't just in Beijing but hundreds of cities across China that pro-democracy protests occurred in 1989. They were also put down by force & to this day, there's little info about fatalities & imprisonments in the provinces. #June4 theguardian.com/world/2019/jun…

@lilkuo .@CHRDnet documents 19 1989 pro-democracy figures currently in prison, 6 recently released from lengthy prison sentences, 3 persecuted to death. The #June4 #TiananmenMassacre lives on in China. Pictured here: #GuoFeixiong #HuShigen #JiangYefei #XiaLin nchrd.org/2019/05/former…

@lilkuo @CHRDnet #CCP murder victim #XiongZhiming ((熊志明), 20, student, the pride of a poor Jiangxi village, shot in the head while trying to help a classmate who'd been shot. His university cremated his remains so as to dispose of evidence. #June4 #TiananmenMassacre truth30.hrichina.org/xiong_zhiming.…

@lilkuo @CHRDnet Thanks to @Yaqiu for this excellent summary of the many ways Chinese people have fought for their basic rights over the past 30 years since the #June4 #TiananmenMassacre, & of the massive repression they've faced. hrw.org/news/2019/05/3…

@lilkuo @CHRDnet @Yaqiu .@hu_jia (who's been sent on 'enforced vacation' during the 30th anniversary of #TiananmenMassacre): “I won’t change, because this is based on feeling. I don’t believe the #CCP is made of iron. I have never lost faith. I don’t think the power of evil can last forever. It won’t.”

@lilkuo @CHRDnet @Yaqiu @hu_jia Rowena He: 'The legacy of Tiananmen doesn't belong to China or to the Chinese people alone. It belongs to the world. Human beings’ longing for freedom & the pursuit of truth & justice are without borders. #June4 violated the core of our shared humanity.' theguardian.com/commentisfree/…

The stage is set.#June4 candlelight vigil on the 30th anniversary of the #TiananmenMassacre, Victoria Park #HK, 8pm. Join us to commemorate one of the most seminal events in recent Chinese & global history & to reaffirm our pledge to continue the struggle for freedom & democracy.

If you can’t make it to the #June4 candlelight vigil at 8pm tonight in Victoria Park #HK, you can watch it live online at 64live.org

The program for tonight’s #June4 candlelight vigil (in Chinese & English) at 8pm, Victoria Park #HK & related materials can be found here: drive.google.com/drive/mobile/f…

League of Social Democrats have hung a 'Don't forget #June4' banner on Beacon Hill #HK. facebook.com/hklsd/photos/a…

In annual #June4 survey, #HK people still condemn the #CCP (68%), support the students of '89 (52%), & call on #CCP to change its stance on the 'incident' (59%). This is esp strong among young ppl: 83% say #CCP was wrong (vs 2% right). #TiananmenMassacre hkupop.hku.hk/english/releas…

Families of 8 #CCP #June4 murder victims have been allowed to visit their loved ones at Wan’an Cemetery in Beijing accompanied by govt officials. #TiananmenMassacre news.rthk.hk/rthk/en/compon…