As June 4th edges closer, Party authorities in China are clamping down on the internet and information.  I suspect Typepad, through which I publish this blog, will soon be blocked in China, too.

But the truth will out, as this story in Reuters suggests:

Du [Daozheng] has joined a small but bold undercurrent within China openly
urging the government to renounce the 1989 crackdown, when hundreds of
demonstrators and bystanders died as troops and tanks surged down
Beijing streets on the night of June 3-4.

A group of Chinese intellectuals has disclosed it recently met on
the capital's outskirts to urge an end to official silence about the
bloodshed 20 years ago.

Their speeches are now circulating on some Chinese-language internet sites and through email.

"As time has passed, this massive secret has become a massive
vacuum. Everyone avoids it, skirts around it," Cui Weiping, a
Beijing-based academic, told the 20 or so participants, who included
some of the nation's most prominent liberal scholars, among them Qian
Liqun, a former professor at Peking University.

"This secret is in fact a toxin poisoning the air around us and affecting our whole lives and spirit," said Cui.

Du and Cui and Qian follow in the tradition of Menicus, speaking truth to power:

Prince T'ien asked: "What is the task of a worthy official?"

"To cultivate the highest of purposes," replied Mencius.

"What do you mean by the highest of purposes?"

"It's simple: Humanity and Duty.  You defy Humanity if you cause the death of a single innocent person, and you defy Duty if you take what is not yours.  What is our dwelling-place if not Humanity?  And what is our road if not Duty?  To dwell in Humanity and follow Duty – that is the perfection of a great person's task." (13.33)

It's simple: the Party leaders who ordered the army to fire on the citizens of Beijing on June 3rd defied Humanity, they are responsible for the deaths of hundreds and hundreds, perhaps thousands, of innocent people.  They are unworthy officials.  That is what the Party cannot admit, that is what it is afraid of.  The suppression of that truth creates the secret, the vacuum, the poison to which Cui refers.

Reverse the verdict!