Photos: Tiananmen Square remembered
Students shout slogans in support of former Communist Party leader and reformer Hu Yaobang, whose death in April 1989 triggered an unprecedented wave of pro-democracy demonstrations. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
On June 4, 1989, Chinese Communist Party leaders sent the military into Beijing’s Tiananmen Square to clear out the student-led pro-democracy demonstrators who had paralyzed the capital for weeks. Hundreds, if not thousands, of people died in the crackdown.
Pro-democracy student protesters face off with security forces in Tiananmen Square. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
In a dorm room at Beijing Teachers College, a classmate listens as Wuer Kaixi, left, one of the student leaders of the pro-democracy movement, speaks his mind. “China still needs Deng Xiaoping but Premier Li Peng should resign,” he said. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
Student-led demonstrators squeeze a line of security forces in Tiananmen Square. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
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Leaders at the headquarters of the All-China Students Federation in Beijing ask the government to speed up democratization. (Thomas Cheng / AFP/Getty Images)
Students march to the square to call for government reform. (Sadayuki Mikami / Associated Press)
Students begin a mass hunger strike. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
Hunger strikers shade themselves during a heat wave as they enter the fifth day. (Toshio Sakai / AFP/Getty Images)
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Hunger strikers in the square. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
President Deng Xiaoping escorts Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev and his wife, Raisa, to the banquet hall of the Great Hall of the People. (Vitaly Armand / AFP/Getty Images)
Mikhail Gorbachev addresses journalists as wife Raisa and Communist Party General Secretary Zhao Ziyang look on. Zhao’s failure to control the student protests led to his ouster in May 1989. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
Hunger strikers receive first aid. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
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Paramedics carry away a hunger striker. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
Workers lend their support to the students’ pro-democracy movement. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
Workers parade through Beijing’s streets in support of the student hunger strikers at the square. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
Beijing magistrates in court uniforms join workers demonstrating in Beijing’s streets. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
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Communist Party leader Zhao Ziyang addresses the student hunger strikers. (AFP/Getty Images)
Student leader Wuer Kaixi walks past a security line in the square. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
A truckload of university instructors rushes at Tiananmen Square to support the student hunger strikers after martial law was proclaimed. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
Pro-democracy demonstrators block a truck filled with security forces headed to Tiananmen Square. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
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Demonstrators gather early in the morning at the square despite the declaration of martial law. (Thomas Cheng / AFP/Getty Images)
Pro-democracy demonstrators applaud university students on armored personnel carriers in Beijing. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
With a banner reading, “Lift martial law and protect the capital,” journalists from the People’s Daily, the Communist Party’s official newspaper, lead a march toward Tiananmen Square. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
A portrait of Mao Tse-tung is covered after it was defaced with paint. A banner on the bottom can be read as, “This is not done by students.” (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
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Workers in a bulldozer show support for student protesters. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
High school students march in the streets near Tiananmen Square. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
Tattered tents at the square. (Jeff Widener / Associated Press)
An art student works on a replica of the Statue of Liberty at the square. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
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A copy of the Statue of Liberty rises in the square. (Toshio Sakai / AFP/Getty Images)
A student newsletter is distributed in the square. (Jeff Widener / Associated Press)
A student asks soldiers to go home. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
At the square. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
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Students and workers armed with sticks gather in Tiananmen Square. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
A student asks members of the security force at the square to go home. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
An antigovernment protester in Beijing holds a rifle in a bus window. (Jeff Widener / Associated Press)
A woman is caught between civilians and Chinese soldiers who were trying to remove her from the square. (Jeff Widener / Associated Press)
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Demonstrators celebrate after the retreat of tens of thousands of troops. (Catherine Henriette / AFP/Getty Images)
Flames rise from an armored personnel carrier near Tiananmen Square. (Thomas Cheng / AFP/Getty Images)
An unidentified foreign journalist is helped from the site of clashes between the army and students near Tiananmen Square. (Thomas Cheng / AFP/Getty Images)
Members of the security force leap over a barrier on Tiananmen Square during heavy clashes with pro-democracy demonstrators. (Thomas Cheng / AFP/Getty Images)
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A girl wounded near the square in the clash between the army and students is evacuated. (Manuel Ceneta / AFP/Getty Images)
More wounded protesters are taken away. (Manuel Ceneta / AFP/Getty Images)
The protests continue around the square amid the bloody crackdown. (Peter Charlesworth / LightRocket via Getty Images)
Pro-democracy demonstrators overturn a bus in front of a burning truck to try to hold up soldiers fighting their way toward Tiananmen Square. (Peter Charlesworth / LightRocket via Getty Images)
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As buses and other vehicles burn, pro-democracy demonstrators retreat while soldiers close in. (Peter Charlesworth / LightRocket via Getty Images)
On the run. (Peter Charlesworth / LightRocket via Getty Images)
An armored personnel carrier burns. (Peter Charlesworth / LightRocket via Getty Images)
The driver of an armored personnel carrier that rammed through student lines, injuring many, lies dead after being beaten by students at the square. (Jeff Widener / Associated Press)
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At a temporary morgue, people look at one of the protesters killed in the Tiananmen crackdown hours before. (Peter Charlesworth / LightRocket via Getty Images)
Civilians holding rocks stand on an armored vehicle in Beijing. (Jeff Widener / Associated Press)
Beijing residents inspect armored personnel carriers set ablaze by protesters trying to keep troops from moving into Tiananmen Square. (Manuel Ceneta / AFP/Getty Images)
Chinese tanks block an overpass on the avenue leading to Tiananmen Square hours after the crackdown. (Peter Charlesworth / LightRocket via Getty Images)
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A demonstrator stands in front of a line of tanks on the Avenue of Eternal Peace. (Jeff Widener / Associated Press)
A truck full of soldiers makes its way near the square after the crackdown. (Jeff Widener / Associated Press)
Chinese troops and tanks mass in Beijing after the military crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators. (Jeff Widener / Associated Press)
The arrest warrant for Chinese astrophysicist Fang Lizhi, accused of instigating the protests, and his wife, Li Shuxian, is seen on state TV. The pair took refuge in the U.S. Embassy, where they remained for a year, before China allowed them to leave for the U.S. (AFP/Getty Images)
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Tanks guard a strategic avenue leading to the square. (Manuel Ceneta / AFP/Getty Images)
A lone cyclist walks past street barriers crushed by tanks during the night of violence in and around Tiananmen Square. Hundreds, if not thousands, of people died in the crackdown. (Peter Charlesworth / LightRocket via Getty Images)