On June 5, Citizen Power’s founder Dr. Yang Jianli received a notice from Roger Friedman, assistant of Nobel Peace Prize laureate, and South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu. Initiatives for China/Citizen Power for China (IFC/CPFC) was informed that the archbishop had signed the appeal initiated by IFC/CPFC to seek the truth about the two Tiananmen tank men. Although the archbishop no longer participates in public events and no longer issues public statements, on the 27th anniversary of the June 4th massacre, he expressed his support for this campaign.
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Archbishop Tutu welcomed Dr. Yang Jianli during their meeting after Dr.Yang was released from Chinese prison.
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IFC/CPFC’s team is greatly encouraged by Archbishop Tutu’s support. Yang Jianli said that with the support of such a charismatic human rights leader, who vigorously supports democracy and freedom for the Chinese people, this campaign and that applying to inscribe the Tiananmen Massacre into UNESCO’s Memory of the World Register will be successful.
When Yang Jianli was jailed in China, Archbishop Tutu was one of the leading voices appealing for his freedom. In December 2012, “Freedom Now” and IFC/CPFC had a public letter sent to the new Chinese leader Xi Jinping. The letter was initiated by Archbishop Desmond Tutu and His Holiness the Dalai Lama and was signed by 135 Nobel Prize laureates calling on release of Liu Xiaobo. Then Archbishop Tutu called on the world to jointly sign this letter, and nearly 500,000 have people responded.
In 2014, on the 25 anniversary of June 4th incident, IFC/CPFC launched a global campaign of Prayer for China. The archbishop publicly expressed his support in saying such activity could “ensure the spirit of Tiananmen victims twenty five years ago be inherited.”
Dr. Han Lianchao, another leader of IFC/CPFC, said that it is extremely important for the tank men campaign to get support from Archbishop Tutu. The Tiananmen-UNESCO’s MoW Register campaign needs attention and support of world’s human rights leaders and IFC/CPFC looks forward to building on the progress and continuing to make unremitting efforts.
Ms. Wang Xueli, chief editor of Yibao, online publication run by IFC/CPFC, commented that Tutu, who chaired the transitional justice in South Africa, understands the importance of protecting June 4th memory, because it is a weapon to punctured the dictators’ mask and drives us to be united in fighting for freedom.
Yang Jianli calls on everyone to continue to promote the Tiananmen campaigns. He said, “These are indefinite campaigns until the truth is obtained.”
Please Sign on the Petition to Seek Truth About the Two Tiananmen Tank Men
The iconic image on Beijing’s Tiananmen Square bravely confronting PLA tanks is one of the most important photographs of the twentieth century. It represents ordinary citizens confronting the State violence, and it is not forgotten by history. Over more than two decades, the whole world has been asking: Where is the tank man? As of today, the background of the tank man “Wang Weilin,” and his subsequent fate are still unknown to the world. At the same time, we should not forget that, despite the CCP’s massacre order, the soldier in the tank chose not to shoot or run over his compatriot. The most logical explanation is that his conscience made him disobey the order. This soldier is equally a hero. As Time magazine pointed out: “[T]he heroes of the tank picture are two: the unknown figure who risked his life by standing in front of the juggernaut and the driver who rose to the moral challenge by refusing to mow down his compatriot. “
Nobody knows the fate of the two heroes, but it is our responsibility to know and to find them. For together, they symbolize that timeless truth that moral courage will triumph over cowardly cruelty.
We hereby launch the initiative of collecting signatures across the world to petition Xi Jinping for the identities, background, and the whereabouts of the two tank men. Please sign your signature and encourage others to sign. There is no deadline for this project, and we will continue to collect signatures until the truth is obtained.
Ways to sign
(1). Go to http://tinyurl.com/
(2). Enter First Name, Last Name, Email, Country, City or Zip code.
(3). If a street address is asked, and privacy is a concern, please enter N/A.
(4). Click sign
Note: When more than one people want to use one same device to sign, the previous signer must click the small arrow beside the signer’s name and then click Log Out before the following one to enter through the link.