The year the dragon came : post-Tiananmen stories

On the 9th of June 1989 I sat on the stage at Parliament House, Canberra, for a national memorial service for those killed at Tiananmen. I had flown from Beijing, where I had lived for four years. As Cultural Counselor at the Australian Embassy there, I knew many of the people, including writers and artists, who took part in the demonstrations that had ended in a brutal crackdown earlier that week, the June 4th massacre. The Labor Prime Minister Bob Hawke paid tribute to "the idealism and courage of youth" the peaceful determination of students to create a better Chinese society," expressing his hope "that the path of reform and modernisation [would] be renewed." He was in tears as he read a cable from the Embassy that gave graphic detail of the violence perpetrated against protestors by the Chinese military. So many Australians had watched the events unfold week after week on television, bringing China close as never before. The pro-democracy demonstrators were heroes with whom to identify.