'Tiananmen Square' cartoon removed from website
A cartoon some Chinese commentators say refers to the Tiananmen Square massacre has been removed from the website of one of the country’s top newspapers, just two days before the crackdown’s 21st anniversary.
The Southern Metropolis Daily published a series of cartoons for International Children’s Day yesterday – one of which showed a little boy drawing a line of tanks on a blackboard with what looked like a soldier standing in front.
The image has been removed from the newspaper’s website after it started being circulated online in China with comments about the 1989 massacre.
One of Tiananmen’s most enduring images is of a man standing in front of a line of tanks in the heart of Beijing and trying to block their way.
The newsdesk at the Southern Metropolis Daily did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the cartoon today.
The 21st anniversary of the crackdown is Friday.
China’s government calls the seven-week, student-led Tiananmen protest a counter-revolutionary riot and has never fully disclosed what happened.
Police are usually quick to snuff out any memorials in Beijing for those killed in the crackdown.
The anniversary this year is being met with official opposition even in Hong Kong, the only place in China where any large public commemorative activities are allowed.
Hong Kong police seized a miniature version of the “Goddess of Democracy” statue used in the original Beijing protests from a pavement on Saturday and arrested 13 activists protecting it.
The activists were freed on bail and police returned the two pieces on Tuesday, but Hong Kong authorities today denied entry to the statue’s creator, New Zealand national Chen Weiming, after he arrived on a flight from Los Angeles.
