June 4 and the crimes of Nazism
Chang Ping says outrage over a German article highlights the suffering of those silenced by history
Ding Zilin, the founder of the support group Tiananmen Mothers, asked recently: "Would Mr Frank Sieren please ask his ancestors what Nazism means?"
She said this after Sieren, the Beijing correspondent of German broadcaster Deutsche Welle, published an article titled "From Tiananmen to Leipzig" on the broadcaster's website on June 4. In the article, he likened the Tiananmen crackdown to a mere "slip" in Chinese contemporary history and said "we might never know what actually happened in Beijing 25 years ago".
He said Western media had treated the Chinese communist government unfairly over the issue, which should be looked at fairly and realistically.
Sieren's article angered many people, including the then leaders of the student movement Wang Dan and Wuer Kaixi, human rights lawyer Teng Biao and members of Tiananmen Mothers, who suffered as a result of the crackdown.
Many have issued petitions and statements in protest, and made the link to Nazism in their objections. Former student leader Zhou Fengsuo put it this way: "Sieren's article is an insult to the victims of the Tiananmen crackdown. It's the equivalent of a denial of the Holocaust in Germany."
Some German people have also signed the letter of protest, but would they agree that the June 4 crackdown is essentially the same as the Holocaust?
