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- <text id=89TT1607>
- <link 89TT1661>
- <title>
- June 19, 1989: China's Dark Hours
- </title>
- <history>
- TIME--The Weekly Newsmagazine--1989
- June 19, 1989 Revolt Against Communism
- </history>
- <article>
- <source>Time Magazine</source>
- <hdr>
- COMMUNISM, Page 14
- China's Dark Hours
- </hdr><body>
- <p> In the tense early-morning hours of June 4, hope died and
- fear was born. Thousands of combat troops stormed Tiananmen
- Square, transforming the Woodstock-like encampment of young
- students calling for democracy into the bloodiest killing ground
- in Communist China's history. The images of defiance and
- devastation, the voices of determination and despair, shook the
- world. Here, protesters attacked troops with poles and rocks.
- There, a student lurched, his dazed face soaked with blood.
- Everywhere, the bodies fell, how many is still not known, while
- fires blazed, signaling the dawn of China's uncertain new world.
- </p>
- <p> "Our call for democracy has reached the living rooms of
- largely apolitical people. It has planted seeds of the ideas of
- freedom and democracy and human rights."
- </p>
- <p> -- A student leader
- </p>
- <p> "We are not afraid to die. But we have already lost a lot
- of blood. We must leave the square."
- </p>
- <p> -- Hou Dejian, a popular songwriter
- </p>
- <p> "The sound of gunfire terrified me, but the sight of
- wounded people made me very angry. The massacre was a very
- cynical idea."
- </p>
- <p> -- A scholar
- </p>
- <p> "Tell the United Nations, tell the world what has happened
- in China. Tell them that the Chinese government is killing the
- Chinese people."
- </p>
- <p> -- A worker
- </p>
- <p> "China is dead."
- </p>
- <p> -- A youth
- </p>
-
- </body></article>
- </text>
-
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