Marco Rubio Marks Tiananmen Square Massacre Anniversary: ‘The World Will Never Forget’

Secretary of State Marco Rubio published a statement on Tuesday in anticipation of the 36th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre, condemning the Chinese Communist Party for its indiscriminate slaughter of peaceful pro-democracy dissidents — and its attempts to erase the incident from history.

In the summer of 1989, anti-communist activists, many of them teenage students, began organizing peaceful events in Beijing urging their totalitarian government to consider a path towards freedom, demanding the right to vote, freedom of expression, and other basic civil liberties. The Communist Party moved rapidly to crush these voices — in some cases literally, sending armored tanks into the heart of the capital and deploying the military to open fire on these protesters. On June 4 of that year, the military moved into Tiananmen Square, where the protesters had established a presence, and ruthlessly eliminated them.

Reports indicate that the Chinese military opened fire on crowds of unarmed protesters, killing indiscriminately. Researchers have found evidence that the military also killed many rushed to hospitals in the aftermath of the attack to fully eliminate all participants in the pro-democracy movement. Some estimates suggest that as many as 10,000 people were killed in the massacre.

Among the most iconic images of the Tiananmen Square massacre is an image of a man holding what appears to be a grocery bag standing directly in front of a line of tanks. Video footage of that encounter indicates the man actively attempted to block the tanks, at one point climbing on top of them.

“Hundreds of thousands of ordinary people in the capital and throughout China took to the streets for weeks to exercise their freedoms of expression and peaceful assembly by advocating for democracy, human rights, and an end to rampant corruption,” Rubio recognized in his statement.

“The CCP [Chinese Communist Party] responded with a brutal crackdown, sending the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to open fire in an attempt to extinguish the pro-democracy sentiments of unarmed civilians gathered on Beijing’s streets and in Tiananmen Square,” he continued.

“The CCP actively tries to censor the facts, but the world will never forget,” Rubio asserted.

“Today we commemorate the bravery of the Chinese people who were killed as they tried to exercise their fundamental freedoms, as well as those who continue to suffer persecution as they seek accountability and justice for the events of June 4, 1989,” he concluded. “Their courage in the face of certain danger reminds us that the principles of freedom, democracy, and self-rule are not just American principles. They are human principles the CCP cannot erase.”

The Chinese Foreign Ministry reportedly condemned Rubio’s statement. During his regular briefing on Wednesday, spokesman Lin Jian reportedly addressed the statement, without mentioning the Tiananmen Square massacre, which Beijing typically pretends did not happen.

“The erroneous statements by the US side maliciously distort historical facts, deliberately attack China’s political system and developmental path, and seriously interfere in China’s internal affairs,” Lin complained, according to the Agence France-Presse (AFP). “The Chinese side is strongly dissatisfied with this and firmly opposes it. We have lodged a solemn protest with the U.S. side.”

Lin’s remarks are notably absent from the official transcript of his briefing on the Foreign Ministry’s website, which make no mention of the anniversary.

Rubio’s statement was more forceful and specific than those of other Western governments, though many acknowledged the anniversary on Wednesday. The British embassy in China, for example, published a vague video that appeared to honor “tank man.”

The governments of Canada and Australia posted images of candles to honor the dead, a reference to the decades-long candlelight vigil that traditionally took place in Hong Kong since 1990 to recognize those who died opposing Chinese communism.

The Chinese Communist Party has not allowed that vigil, typically held in Victoria Park, to take place since the anti-communist protests in that city in 2019. In 2020, regime-controlled Hong Kong officials canceled the vigil, allegedly to prevent the spread of the Wuhan coronavirus, but it has never been allowed again. This week, officials occupied Victoria Park with a “patriotic” food fair to prevent any organized display of solidarity with those killed. According to the Hong Kong Free Press (HKFP), the government flooded the area around Victoria Park with armored vehicles and harassed citizens who appeared even remotely to be recognizing the date, hassling elderly women holding flowers anywhere near the park, for example.

In Beijing, reports indicate that tensions are running high. The Communist Party has closely monitored and harassed members of the Tiananmen Mothers group — those who lost children to the killings in 1989 — to intimidate them out of participating in an annual cemetery meeting to honor their children and keep the memory of the event alive. Tiananmen mother Zhang Xianling, 88, told Radio Free Asia (RFA) that she had been under close surveillance since April, despite needing a wheelchair for much of her movement and posing no visible threat.

A curious incident occurred in Tiananmen Square itself on Tuesday, which some have linked to the anniversary, though few details are available. The social media account “Mr. Li Is Not Your Teacher” — which posts videos of dissident activity and other news smuggled out of China — published a video of a man apparently disrupting a flag-raising ceremony in the square on Tuesday.

The man ran towards the flag pole but did not get far before state security grabbed him and whisked him away, leaving his objective unclear.

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