Foundinchina.com

Buy your candles over the weekend – there are only five days to go. We should not only consider the victims of natural disasters, but also those that were murdered. The hundreds who died on the orders of the CCP on that fateful evening 19 years ago, gave their lives asking for the freedoms that so many Chinese enjoy today. Their blood fuelled China’s economic miracle; they deserve to be remembered.   

In the last couple of days I’ve had the privilege of discussing the extraordinary Nobel peace prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi in some of my classes. Sadly, although not surprisingly, not a single student recognised either her name or the picture that I used at the beginning of the lesson.

Myanmar’s (Burma) internationally recognised and respected prime minister-elect is a mystery figure to the people of China. And I don’t mean that they find her to be a strange individual given to dabbling in the occult; I mean they don’t find her at all. Not in textbooks, not on television, not in the newspaper; and certainly not in the politics classroom. After all, she’s not the type of girl that Beijing has any interest in providing information about.

After Suu Kyi was democratically elected in a general election in 1990 by an overwhelming margin, the military junta decided that she belonged under lock and key rather than acting out her rightful place as head of government. The people’s choice has since spent the majority of the intervening years under house arrest, where she continues to fight with grace and determination for democracy and justice in Myanmar.

I’m prepared to concede that a significant percentage of 20 year-old university students around the globe may also be unaware of the existence of Aung San Suu Kyi. But in their cases (DPRK and a few others excepted) it’s because they’re not inclined to pick up a newspaper, whereas in China the reason is that the information is simply not available. It’s not that Myanmar is never in the news, as witnessed by the recent coverage of the cyclone disaster (a favourable comparison in relief efforts for the CCP). Rather, as one might suspect, it’s because China does a lot of business with the military dictatorship and has no material interest in altering the status quo. The argument that China doesn’t interfere in the internal affairs of other countries is not valid here; it’s certainly not interference to provide factual information about the nature of Myanmar’s regime and the suffering and death they have caused.

In fairness, China is not alone in supporting Myanmar’s despots, as this article from last year indicates. But it is certain that as long as China refuses to acknowledge the military junta as violators of human rights, they cannot seriously be considered either globally or regionally responsible.

Bear in mind that Beijing has no problems when it comes to reporting on the domestic policies of other countries. Not all other countries, of course; Zimbabwe would be another example of conspicuous silence, but then Mugabe and Myanmar’s military junta have a lot in common. Leaving aside that particular comparison, Myanmar is China’s neighbour and should have a flourishing economy founded on tourism, vast natural resources, and a rich cultural heritage. Instead, the people have suffered violence and economic catastrophe under the junta’s restrictive and vengeful regime.

China didn’t invent a foreign policy based on self-interest; recent history can provide countless examples of the transgressions of other nations. But this is happening in China’s own backyard. And they are interfering in the internal affairs of their neighbour when they actively support a regime that undermines the most basic of its people’s human rights and dignities. If China wants to be respected as a responsible world power then it must show the kind of moral leadership that has too often been lacking in those that came before. All Hu Jintao and company need do to signal the end of oppression in Myanmar is to pull the plug. Do they have the humanitarian backbone necessary to do this? Somehow I doubt it.   

Before responding, please consider that last sentence carefully. I’m going to delete any knee-jerk responses along the lines of “yeah, but look what your/that/XXX country did…” 

There was on Monday, precisely one week and three minutes after the deadly Sichuan earthquake, a mass outburst of spontaneous feeling in Tian’anmen Square. 

As an announcement signalled the end of three minutes silence, the crowd surrounded the flag and began shouting their devotions to the people of Sichuan and the Motherland. 

Two things are of great significance here. First, the gathering was unauthorised but tolerated; second, the flag wasn’t lowered for either an emperor or a dictator.

The last time people gathered in huge numbers on the Square to speak with one voice – a voice of hope – it all ended very differently. That was arguably the defining moment in China’s modern history, and yet it remains an incident forbidden as the subject of debate or review. The supreme irony is that the compassionate and immediate response to this disaster has shown the Chinese government to be the caring, responsible leaders that the demonstrators were demanding 19 years ago.

Given that the Chinese leaders are currently riding the crest of an immense wave of popularity, why not take this moment to enhance their reputation still further? To achieve this they need only authorise the lowering of the flag in 14 days time. No announcements. No fanfare. No propaganda. Just a simple act of humility and remembrance that is long overdue. Everyone would immediately grasp the significance and it would be met with unprecedented and universal praise.

But there are reasons greater than earning domestic and international plaudits for a half-mast gesture on June 4. Yesterday’s flag lowering for the common man was fully justified, but ultimately a response to great suffering wrought by Mother Nature; an unavoidable tragedy. When tragedy struck Nineteen years ago, it was a premeditated strike against the common man.

Prior to the massacre of innocents, Beijing in ’89 had, in common with this past week, also been a time when the People’s Liberation Army had found a place in the hearts of the populace when they refused to turn their guns on the teachers, students, farmers and others who had gathered under the same banner. The local PLA units, sympathetic to the plight of the protesters, were cheered as they left the Square. Ultimately, mass murder would be committed, under direct orders from Zhongnanhai, by PLA units from outside provinces.

The loss of face had been too much for the hardliners like Li Peng and Deng Xiaoping to bear, and in common with all history’s craziest acts of despotism, they chose to send in a disaster of their own making.  Desperate to cling to power and eager to punish, a mechanical earthquake was ordered onto the Square and the surrounding streets to crush, maim, and destroy. The only things in common with a natural disaster were the indiscriminate nature of the killings and the large number of innocent victims.  

On Monday the leaders bowed their heads in remembrance at Zhongnanhai. It would be appropriate, although unrealistic, for them to bow their heads in shame in two weeks time. However, allowing the flag in Tian’anmen Square to be lowered in memory of those that died needlessly on June 4 ’89 would be a welcome, responsible, and safe step for the government to take.

Of course, accountability and openness are pre-requisite, so I won’t be holding my breath waiting for it to happen. But I will remember, in company with millions of others, the event that China continues to wipe from the pages of history. Mark your calendars; 14 days to go.

Update: (May 24, 2008) 11 days to go.