DEMOCRACY. File photo of Tiananmen amputee Fang Zheng with a t-shirt printed with the slogan 'democracy-June 4th' in Hong Kong on June 1, 2012. Photo by Philippe Lopez/AFPsay their dream of returning to a democratic China are more distant than ever as their homeland descends further into authoritarianism and state surveillance.
Most of those young protesters drawn to Beijing's streets in the spring of 1989 are now in their early fifties and there is a profound sense of urgency that time is running out to keep alive the memory of what happened. The last thing he remembered before losing consciousness was seeing the shattered white bones of his legs exposed to the air.
He famously rebuked Premier Li Peng on national television, an unprecedented dressing down of a top party official, one who later went on to oversee the deadly crackdown.