Tiananmen Square self-immolation incident

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The incident

The Tiananmen Square self-immolation incident was an event which took place in Tiananmen Square on the eve of Chinese new year, January 23, 2001 when 7 people attempted to set themselves on fire. Footage was broadcast nationally in the People's Republic of China by China Central Television (CCTV). Western news organizations disseminated the story as given by Xinhua, without the possibility of verifying it independently, given the tight censorship exercised by the Chinese authorities.

According to Time, the Government's media war against Falun Gong gained significant traction following the act. The six-month campaign successfully portrayed Falun Gong as an "evil cult" which could unhinge its followers. By repeatedly broadcasting images of a girl’s burning body and interviews with the others saying they believed self-immolation would lead them to paradise, many Chinese were convinced that Falun Gong was evil. The campaign is thought to be the government's first effort to gain public support for the crackdown of Falun Gong, and is "reminiscent of communist political movements -- from the 1950-53 Korean War to the radical Cultural Revolution in the 1960s."

There is controversy as to whether the protagonists were Falun Gong practitioners in reality. The state-owned broadcaster claimed the self-immolators as Falun Gong practitioners. A Time magazine article claims that it was possible for misguided practitioners to have taken it upon themselves to demonstrate in this manner, handing a propaganda opportunity to the Chinese authorities. Falun Gong in New York emphatically deny that these people could have been practitioners on grounds that the teachings explicitly forbid suicide and killing. Falun Gong and some third-party commentators point to apparent inconsistencies in the government's version of events, and claim that the incident was staged in order to build public support for the persecution of the practice.

Background

From April 25, 1999 to July, 1999 about 300 Falun Gong demonstrations were held around the country. On July 22 of the same year, a decision was made by the Chinese Government to ban the group. By August, state controlled newspapers began running lengthy exposés about Falun Gong. In Shanghai, a petition began circulating on February 13 yielding 100,000 signatures in 10 days against the group. Danny Schechter, in his book Falun Gong's Challenge to China, describes these Chinese government petitions as attempts to "thwart attacks on its human rights record", adding that these petitions often generate lots of "support" but lack credibility.

By the end of 1999, close to 35,000 Falun Gong practitioners had been arrested in Beijing. Tiananmen square became one of the prime locations where the practitioners were expected to demonstrate routinely. On January 1, 2001 another 700 Falun Gong demonstrators were arrested in the square. The sizes of protests had dwindled to zero due to the Government crackdown, although a Time article claims "the leadership" had called to step up demonstrations "especially in Tiananmen Square"; the same article also claims that Li Hongzhi had urged followers to use supernatural powers to immobilize the police and other "evil scoundrels" by pointing at them and thinking "freeze."

Amnesty International issued a report in March 2000 calling on the Chinese government to stop "...mass arbitrary detentions, unfair trials and other human rights violations resulting from the crackdown on the Falun Gong..." The report expresses concern with "numerous reports" which allege that Falun Gong practitioners have been "...tortured or subjected to cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment in detention." Another report in December 2000 reports testimonies of torture, detention and ill-treatment, some ending in death. "These deaths in custody are an appalling illustration of the authorities' callous disregard for the lives of people detained solely for their peaceful activities."

Prior to the event, many Chinese had felt that Falun Gong posed no real threat, and that the crackdown had gone too far. A Falun Gong (WOIPFG) paper suggests that a year after initiating the persecution Jiang Zemin considered that the public was not responding as desired. China had failed to "annihilate Falun Gong within three months", the persecution having met with international condemnation, as well as resistance from highly ranked Party officials. However, the public changed from sympathising with Falun Gong to siding with the Government after the event, incited by propaganda in the form of human interest stories and accounts of so-called rehabilitation efforts of former practitioners. Hostility toward Falun Gong from the general public escalated, the campaign of persecution "clearly intensified," "hate crimes" targeting Falun Gong increased, and the death toll during police arrests or in prisons, labor camps and "brainwashing centers" all sharply increased.

On January 1, 2001, Li Hongzhi published an article called "Beyond the Limits of Forbearance" which Time claims appealed to more radical practitioners. Therein, Li refers to the Chinese authorities as "evil", and wrote that persecution of the Fa by evil could no longer be tolerated: "In personal cultivation, there is usually no going beyond the limits of Forbearance." "Completely eliminating the evil is for Fa-rectification, and not a matter of personal cultivation." This was later clarified to mean non-violent forms of exposing and resisting the persecution.

The act

On January 23, 2001 (Chinese New Year's eve) a group of men and women attempted to set themselves on fire in Tiananmen square, five succeeded at ignition.

Romanized name	Chinese name	Relations	Ignited	Description	Outcome
Wang Jin-dong	王進東		yes	Male	Hospitalized; 15 years' imprisonment
Liu Chun-ling	劉春玲	Mother of Si-ying	yes	Female	Died on the spot
Liu Si-ying	劉思影	Daughter of Chun-ling	yes	12 year old girl	Died weeks later after the event
Chen Guo	陳果	Daughter of Hao Hui-jun	yes	19 year old college student, Female	Treated at Beijing Jishuitan Hospital; severely disfigured
Hao Hui-jun	郝惠君	Mother of Chen Guo	yes	Female	Hospitalized; severely disfigured
Liu Bao-rong	劉葆榮		no	Male	Life sentence
Liu Yun-fang	劉雲芳		no	Male	Failed to ignite gasoline

A man sat down on the pavement northeast of the Monument to the People's Heroes at the center of the square, poured gasoline on his clothes and set himself on fire. Moments later four more people set themselves alight. A CNN camera crew were on hand to record the event. CNN producer Lisa Weaver said she could "smell burning flesh as the van slowly passed." As they were taping, military police stepped in, detained the crew, and confiscated their tapes. Nearby police with fire-extinguishers ran to the victims and put out the flames within the space of a minute.

The Chinese authorities claimed that the seven people who attempted suicide were all from Kaifeng in Henan Province. Six of them reportedly took the train to Beijing on January 16, meeting Chen Guo there. State-run media reports that they agreed to light themselves in different parts of the square at 2:30 pm; they smuggled gasoline into the square using plastic Sprite bottles; each had been armed with two lighters in case one would fail. Two died and three were severely disfigured by the act. The burn victims then underwent long treatment in hospital.

Reporting and analysis

False Fire by New Tang Dynasty Television The programme attempted to deconstruct the event, and challenges several apparent inconsistencies in the Chinese Government's version of the story: The hair and bottle of gasoline at the feet of the alleged self immolator is intact, although this should have caught fire first. Police, not normally known to carry fire extinguishers on duty, appeared to have pieces of fire-fighting equipment on hand on the day of the self-immolations. Liu Chunling, appears to be hit on the head by a blunt object as police attempt to put out the fire. The programme argues that Liu died from a severe blow to the head. The camera of the CCTV footage zooms in on the scene as it unfolds; surveillance cameras in Tiananmen Square are usually fixed. Wang Jindong shouts comments that do not form part of Falun Dafa teachings; his sitting position also does not reflect the full or half lotus position as in the Falun Dafa teachings. The hospital treatment of the victims, as recorded by Chinese state media, is inconsistent with proper care of severe burn victims: for instance, patients were not kept in sterile rooms The girl who allegedly underwent a tracheotomy appeared to be able to speak and sing clearly mere days after the surgery

Xinhua claimed that the self-immolators were "avid" practitioners, allegedly having taken up the practice between 1995 and 1997. Xinhua also claimed that during the week preceding the event, they fantasised about "how wonderful it would be to enter heaven." Though this language is not to be found anywhere in the Falun Gong teachings.

Many Western news organizations published the same story and in much the same way as state-controlled Xinhua, as there were no sources to verify facts independently, given the tight state censorship. Nevertheless, The Guardian reports that some observers believe it is possible that the victims attempted suicide in desperation and confusion about Mr Li's radical "new scripture"; Time considers "implausible" that the act was set up by the Government, stating that Falun Gong had been caught off-guard by the act, and the leadership's damage control after the immolations proved to be inadequate. Danny Schechter, however, doubts Falun Gong would deny being involved in the incident if it was a genuine protest. In the National Review, the Laogai Research Foundation suggested that it was "hardly a farfetched hypothesis" that the government allowed or staged the incident to discredit Falun Gong, as the government "promised" to crush Falun Gong before the eightieth anniversary celebrations of the Communist Party in July. The article concludes that while the "PRC's propaganda coup" against Falun Gong is within the context of popular understandings of other immolations in recent Asian history, "...this situation is not clear", and for the Communists, this was just "another lie."

A video programme of the incident, False Fire, produced by Falun Gong related media outlet New Tang Dynasty Television, claims a number of inconsistencies in the state's version of events (see insert), and also states that prior to 23 January 2001, there had been no incidents of self-immolation among Falun Gong practitioners in the world. WOIPFG describes the self-immolation incident as a major tool in the "regime’s global campaign to slander Falun Gong," and an "enormous fabrication" by the Jiang regime as part of its national campaign to frame and vilify Falun Gong practitioners to the Chinese people; the tactics are said to be of "utmost viciousness."

A Falun Gong press statement criticises western media for giving Xinhua's reports so much credibility and airtime, given that Xinhua openly admits its function is to disseminate propaganda for the Chinese regime. Falun Gong further stated that "much remains unclear and unknown about the circumstances surrounding the incident", including what took place in the week between the incident and when the "fully engineered news articles and television programs" were released. International Educational Development (IED), a human rights NGO stated in a press release from a UN human rights sub-committee:

The Government had sought to justify its terrorism against Falun Gong by calling it an evil cult that had caused deaths and the break-up of families, but the organization's investigation showed that the only deaths and resulting family breakups had been at the hands of Chinese authorities, who had resorted to extreme torture and unacceptable detention of thousands of people. International Educational Development had discovered that a self-immolation cited by the Chinese Government as proof that the Falun Gong was an "evil cult" in fact had been staged.

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According to Falun Gong, one of the immolator did not sit with one leg crossed according to the Falun full or half lotus stance , and also the hair and the bottle of gasoline at it's feet is intact, although this should have caught fire first.

The victims

Falun Gong press statements denied any practitioners were involved in the incident, and accused the PRC Government of attempting to discredit the practice of Falun Gong. "...The teachings of Falun Gong prohibit any form of killing. Mr. Li Hongzhi... has explicitly stated that suicide is a sin." In addition, Falun Gong related commentators pointed out that the main participants' account of the incident and other aspects of the participants' behaviour are inconsistent with the teachings of Falun Dafa. CNN had reported that four of the victims were seen in flames with their hands "in a classic Falun Gong meditation pose", causing Falun Gong to file a complaint to CNN.

Although a Time article reports, "one Beijing arm" of Falun Gong suggested the immolators were practitioners, the New York head office categorically stated "This so-called suicide attempt on Tiananmen Square has nothing to do with Falun Gong practitioners..." Time suggests that this is a "lack of solidarity" is contributing to the sense of desperation of Mainland Chinese practitioners who may feel "out of touch" with the exiled leadership. The Guardian comments that Li had confused his supporters in his New Year message that forbearance did not mean tolerating evil, and that "various measures at different levels can be used to stop it and eradicate it". Days later, Falun Gong in New York was forced to admit "certain disciples had some extreme interpretations [and thought] we are going to resort to violence", and clarified stating that Mr Li meant it was time to "bring the truth to light" about China's atrocities.

A New York Times article states that the conflicting claims were difficult to assess "With propaganda streaming in from seemingly opposite ends of the universe... especially since the remaining Falun Gong practitioners have been driven underground and China tightly controls its news media." It also notes that one of the victims was able to "fluidly perform" Falun Gong's signature slow-motion exercises in front of Western media.

According to the Hong Kong NGO Information Center for Human Rights and Democracy, all of the immolators except 12-year-old Liu Siying had previously protested for Falun Gong in Tiananmen Square. Schechter writes that a CNN producer at the scene, "standing just fifty feet away" said she did not see any children. He writes that while the government claims that doctors performed a tracheotomy on the child, she "...wouldn't have been able to speak to the Chinese media so soon after the tragedy."

After denying press access to the victims for a year after the incident, in April 2002 the Government "suddenly" granted foreign press interviews in the presence of state officials. When asked why they set themselves on fire, Hao Huijun said that she had realised the futility of writing letters and demonstrating by waving banners, "so finally, we decided...to make a big event to show our will to the world." “We wanted to show the government that Falun Gong was good.”

Liu Chunling

Xinhua reported that Huo Xiuzhen, Liu Chunling's adoptive mother, spoke of her daughter's "obsession with Falun Gong", her "worshipping of Li Hongzhi", and how she would teach her daughter to practice Falun Gong. Liu's neighbours, when interviewed by the International Herald Tribune, stated that she was not a native of Kaicheng, was deeply troubled, and was accused of beating her mother and daughter. None of the interviewed had ever seen her practice Falun Gong. Schechter doubts that Liu was a practitioner, based on the observations in the Tribune. Referring to the same Tribune report, a Falun Gong article disputes that Liu Chunling was a practitioner, saying that Falun Gong practitioners hold themselves to high moral standards, and that "the unfortunate woman, who died in the self immolation incident worked as a bar hostess and was witnessed beating her step-mother and child", and that this "is not conduct according to a Falun Gong practitioner's standard." Specifically, Zhuan Falun urges tolerance, and followers should not lose their temper in disciplining children.

Commenting on a slow motion footage of the video broadcast by State-run Xinhua News Agency made available by Falun Gong, Charles A Radin of Boston Globe says: "...it appears that Liu Chunling.... collapsed not from the flames but from being bludgeoned by a man in a military overcoat." Falun Gong also says that the body language of the policemen suggests foul-play.

Wang Jindong

Wang Jindong, serving a 15 year sentence in Henan Provincial Prison, denied that he had been bribed by the government to stage the incident, and said he felt humiliated "because of my stupidity and fanatical ideas."

WOIPFG claims that the Speech Processing Laboratory at National Taiwan University, "a world-renowned laboratory in Chinese speech identification, synthesis and verification" analysed the broadcasts, and apparently concluded that "Wang Jindong" who first appeared on CCTV isn’t the same person who appeared the second and third time. Falun Gong also claims conflicting accounts among state media about when Wang was supposed to have started practicing Falun Gong, as well as several other apparent inconsistencies in the different portrayed versions of the events on day of the immolation, for example, whether he was standing or sitting when he shouted.

Aftermath

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Beijing police at the scene

Government actions

Following the incident, Tiananmen Square was shut down. Seven days after the event, China Central TV aired their footage of five people in flames, said to be taken by nearby surveillance cameras.

The government immediately used the twelve-year-old Liu Siying as an example that Falun Gong was harmful to children. After having had a tracheotomy, according to Government sources, she was able to speak through "approved media outlets", saying that her own mother told her to set herself on fire to reach the "heavenly golden kingdom". The media parade incited 8 million students to join the "Anti-Cult action by the Youth Civilized Communities Across the Nation". Posters, leaflets, videos and lectures began in the class rooms national wide about the supposed detrimental effects of the practice. Regular anti-Falun Gong classes were scheduled in schools, with 12 million children submitting writings disapproving of the practice.

Within a month, authorities issued a glossy pamphlet entitled The Whole Story of the Self Immolation Incident Created by Falun Gong Addicts in Tiananmen Square featuring color photographs of charred bodies. The State Council's "Office for the Prevention and Handling of Evil Cults", declared after the event that it was now ready to form a united front with the global anti-cult struggle. The state controlled media has attacked Falun Gong and Li Hongzhi on a daily basis, morning and night. Meetings have been taking place in factories, offices and universities; schools have been ordered to "educate" pupils about the sect. The Government announced that religious leaders from across the country have delivered denunciations. In Kaifeng, the post office issued an anti-Falun Gong postmark, and 10,000 people signed a petition denouncing the group.

By March 2001, before the National People's Congress, Premier Zhu Rongji and former Premier Li Peng made it clear that the elimination of the group was top priority. An anti-cult exhibition targeting Falun Gong was held in July 2001 at the China People's Revolution Military Museum in Beijing; Beijing newspapers have run exhibits of former practitioners thanking the Communist party for rescuing them; in the form of a cartoon of Li Hongzhi covered in swastikas, the Communist party compared Li to Adolf Hitler.

The surviving victims' fate

Liu Yunfang was sentenced to life imprisonment, Wang Jindong received a fifteen-year sentence, and a Beijing resident who provided them lodging and helped in the preparation received a seven-year sentence.

At the time of the April 2002 meeting with foreign press, Chen Guo and her mother were still in the hospital. Chen had a face of blotchy grafted skin with no nose and no ears and one eye covered by a flap of skin; she had lost both her hands. Her mother had also lost her hands, ears and nose; both eyes were covered with skin grafts. The fire had left Wang Jindong with scarred, leathery cheeks and blackened fingers.

See also

• Tiananmen Square protests of 1989
• List of campaigns of the Communist Party of China