[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 75 (Wednesday, June 4, 1997)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5279-S5280]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         IN MEMORY OF TIANANMEN

 Mr. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, I rise today to note the solemn 
anniversary of the massacre of Chinese students and prodemocracy 
activists in Tiananmen Square, and to honor the memory of the men and 
women who were so cruelly murdered by the totalitarian regime of the 
People's Republic of China.
  No one who witnessed the events will soon forget the images of 
students and others rallying around the Goddess of Democracy statue, 
modeled on Bartholdi's Statue of Liberty Enlightening the World in New 
York harbor.
  The Chinese Government has long argued that democracy is inimical to 
Asian values and that Americans' insistence on human rights is a form 
of cultural imperialism. The students in Tiananmen Square provided the 
most compelling refutation of such tripe.
  Our hope that we were witnessing the dawn of a new era in China was 
dashed when, on June 4, 1989, the so-called People's Liberation Army 
moved into Tiananmen to thwart the aspirations of the Chinese people. 
The photograph

[[Page S5280]]

of one lone Chinese individual--Wang Weilin--confronting a column of 18 
PLA tanks is both a tribute to the courage of the Chinese people and a 
fitting emblem for a regime that believes it can crush ideas with 120 
millimeter guns and hold back the tide of history with bayonets.
  I am sorry to say that since 1989, China has continued to silence 
dissent. So much so that the State Department reported this year that 
by 1996, ``all public dissent against the party and government was 
effectively silenced by intimidation, exile, the imposition of prison 
terms, administrative detention, or house arrest. No dissidents were 
known to be active at year's end.''
  On this occasion, let us honor the memory of those who were slain and 
reiterate our solidarity with Chinese dissidents imprisoned by their 
government.

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